Even as traffic snarls along the 17-km Edapally-Aroor NH 66 corridor is set to worsen when the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) begins work on an elevated highway in mid-2024, uncertainty looms large about developing roads that take off from the stretch.
The alleged delay by the Greater Cochin Development Authority (GCDA) in finalising a compensation package has led to the stalemate over developing Chilavannur Bund Road that begins from Thykoodam, while the fate of the project to widen the 3.60-km NH bypass-Thammanam-Pullepady-MG Road as a four-lane stretch hangs in the balance due to alleged delay in handing over the stretch to the Public Works department (PWD).
The Local Self-Government department (LSGD) had handed over the stretch to the Revenue department, which in turn ought to have handed it over to the PWD in December 2023, the revised deadline. This did not happen and the Revenue authorities have sought more time to hand over to the PWD the land that had been acquired and also the tracts of land that have been marked to be acquired. Only then can rest of the land be acquired and the work to construct a four-lane road begin, informed sources said.
The State government had during the past 13 years earmarked ₹125 crore to develop the stretch in order to augment east-west connectivity, thus decongesting Banerjee Road, SA Road and also the NH bypass and M.G. Road.
Sources in the Kerala Road Fund Board (KRFB) to which the PWD had entrusted the work to develop the stretch said that the final alignment, after taking into consideration the one that was readied in 2023 and the earlier alignment proposed by the Kochi Corporation, too is awaited from the PWD’s design wing. “This must be approved by MLAs concerned and the chief engineer of KRFB, following which laying of boundary stones can begin. Procedures like social impact assessment and payment of compensation would follow, before taking possession of the requisite land,” they said.
Ruing the delay in handing over the stretch to the PWD and in readying its alignment, 35 years after the project was mooted and vast many people surrendering land free of cost, residents under the banner of Thammanam-Pullepady Road Vikasana Samithi had repeatedly sought the State government’s attention to the plight of scores of landowners who were unable to construct houses or shops in their land or to sell them.
They had in November 2023 petitioned Public Works Minister P.A. Mohamed Riyas, demanding speeding up of the project that was entangled in red tape.
