Plan To Ease Traffic Flow In Delhi
In a move to decongest Delhi, the government proposes to construct a fast-track expressway traffic bypass between Faridabad and Ghaziabad via Noida. It will be constructed on a build-operate-transfer (BOT) basis at an estimated cost of Rs 1,000 crore. The route length will be 56 km.
The aim is to reduce the traffic pressure in Delhis urban industrial suburbs as also on the city transport network. The project will be implemented within three years of the allotment of the project. The planning board of the National Capital Territory has been asked to pick up the BOT promoter.
Minister of state for urban affairs and employment U Venkateswarlu, who disclosed this at a meeting of the parliamentary consultative committee attached to his ministry, stated that another traffic decongestion measure the rail-based mass rapid transport system was making substantial progress. The first phase is scheduled to be completed by March 31, 2005. Notifications for acquisition of about 199 hectares out of 220 hectares of private land required for the purpose have been issued. A joint venture company consisting of the Centre and the Delhi government as equal equity partners has been constituted to set up the project. An agreement has been signed with Overseas Economic Co-operation Fund, which is offering soft loan to finance 60 per cent of the project cost. The project will have 44.3 km of surface/elevated and 11 km of underground corridors.
The minister said another traffic decongestion measure under consideration was to set up an Urban Transport Development Fund in the ninth plan at the national level, as recommended by a sub-group of the Planning Commission on urban transport. The fund is designed to offer financial support to the urban transport projects in the country.
The idea is that the initial capital for launching the project will come from the Union government while the levies and taxes which thegovernment will impose in cities with over 1 million population will provide additional finance to augment the size of the corpus. The sub-group on urban transport has recommended that the states having over a million population should set up separate directorates of urban transport and they should be manned by transport professionals.
At present, there are nine cities with a population of over 2 million and the sub-groups recommendation is that each of these cities should have a suitable rail-based mass transport systems in addition to the traffic systems already existing.