Centre announces road projects worth Rs 60,000 cr for Tamil Nadu

Work for Chennai-Bengaluru Expressway expected to begin next year-end

Union Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Minister Nitin Gadkari on Thursday said road projects worth around Rs 60,000 crore has been sanctioned for Tamil Nadu.

He also said several thousand crore rupees worth of projects in logistics and ports will be developed in Tamil Nadu.

Interacting with reporters in Chennai, Gadkari said the work of Rs 20,000 crore Chennai-Bengaluru Expressway is expected to start next year-end, provided 80 per cent of the land that is needed for the project is acquired by Tamil Nadu.

The expressway is one of the 12 such projects launched by the central government.

Gadkari also said sanction has been given for three elevated corridor projects - Tambaram-Chengalpattu; Poonamallee-Maduravoyal, Chennai-Nellore - involving an outlay of around Rs 5,000 crore.

According to him, the road stretch between Tambaram-Vandalur and Vandalur to Guduvancheri will also be widened.

The other road projects sanctioned for Tamil Nadu include Chennai-Tada, Trichy-Chidambaram National Highway, Poonamallee-Walajapet, and Villupuram-Nagapattinam.

Gadkari said that work on the above four projects would commence soon and the government will also look at the construction of bus stations with the standards similar to airports.

He said 1,300 km stretch of new National Highway will be given to Tamil Nadu.

Referring to the road accidents in Tamil Nadu, Gadkari said 61 'black spots' have been identified in the state and they will be removed to bring down the accident rates.

He said the 'black spots' are due to bad road engineering.

In respect of the port sector, he said the draft in the Tuticorin Port would be deepened further so that big mother vessels can be berthed at the port and avoiding transhipment of export cargo at Colombo or Singapore ports.

According to him, Cochin Shipyard will make fishing trawlers that would enable Tamil Nadu fishermen to go deeper into the sea to fish.

Gadkari said the central government is also looking at developing cruise tourism in the country.