The Kerala Road Fund Board (KRFB) is gearing up to ready the revised alignment of the 3.60-km M.G. Road-Pullepady-Thammanam-NH Bypass corridor after the Kochi Corporation handed over the original alignment readied years ago.
It will be followed by laying of boundary stones, ending the stalemate over the long-overdue development of the corridor, the land acquisition process of which began about three decades ago. Once developed, the four-lane corridor is expected to considerably augment east-west connectivity, thus decongesting S.A. Road and Banerjee Road. The new corridor will also lessen congestion at Vyttila and Palarivattom junctions on the Edappally-Aroor NH 66 Bypass.
It had been reported earlier this year that the alignment will see minor alterations, in keeping with KRFB norms regarding curves and elevation, to ensure fast and safe navigation. The alteration of the alignment is critical at Thammanam Junction, where traffic chaos prevails due to rampant encroachments.
Official sources said boundary stones that had been laid in keeping with the old alignment prepared by the Kochi Corporation were missing in many areas. The compilation of the old alignment by the Corporation will shed light on the precise location of the stones. A resolution passed in this regard by the Corporation Council will be handed over shortly to the KRFB, after which the Revenue department will hand over the stretch to the Public Works department (PWD). It will be followed by the KRFB, the requisition agency, kickstarting the land acquisition procedures.
The requisite land can be taken over by July 2024, if everything goes according to plan. It would take another two years (by 2026) to ready the four-lane road, since a two-lane bridge parallel to the Pullepady Bridge too would have to be built, added official sources.
Sources in the Kochi Corporation said the next council meeting would pass a resolution, which would complete the process of handing over the road, owned by the civic body, to the PWD.
Expressing concern over the tardy pace of procedures, Jayakumar S. Das, a landowner on the corridor, said most people were fed up of the delay. “Commuters are agitated about the traffic chaos that has become the norm on city roads and also along the NH Bypass. Kochi is being denied its share of road development projects, even as cities such as Thiruvananthapuram and Kozhikode have considerably augmented their arterial road network under projects like CRIP [City Road Improvement Project],” he said.
