Metro Rail begins work on link roads

HYDERABAD: Works relating to Hyderabad Metro Rail such as laying of storm water drains, new roads for linking internal localities to the main roads for proper connectivity and widening of roads began on Friday.

As more than 90 percent of Right of Way (RoW) is available on the three corridors, HMR authorities are confident of completing the works on all the three by 2016 at a cost of Rs 14,182 crore.

Certain stretches like Stage 1 (Nagole-Mettuguda, 8 km) of Corridor-III) and Stage 2 (Miyapur-Sanjeeva Reddy Nagar, 11 km) of Corridor-I will be completed by December 2014 as works were already grounded by L&T Metro Rail (Hyderabad) Ltd (L&TMRHL).

HMRL managing director NVS Reddy, along with MLAs Jayaprakash Narayan (Kukatpally) and Bhikshapati Yadav (Seri Lingampally), and officials of HMR and GHMC inspected metro facilitation works at Moosapet and IDL Cheruvu, widening of national highway and laying of link roads connecting IDL Cheruvu, Usha Mullapudi Junction, JNTU Junction, Nizampet Junction, Nizamapet and Miyapur depot.

'Minor hurdles are bound in such huge projects and the government will remove them through negotiations and legal recourse.

For land losers here, the government was giving a very good compensation, ie, Rs 45,000 per sq.yd and tenants and hawkers were being rehabilitated under RR package,' Reddy explained.

The two legislators agreed that metro rail was the need of the hour to solve the ever-growing traffic problems in the twin cities. Jayaprakash Narayan suggested seamless travel, ie a commuter, after getting off the train, should be able to catch an RTC bus immerdiately to reach his destination.

And, he also suggested one common ticket for the metro rail and feeder bus service. Bhikshapati Yadav wanted the Corridor-I extended from Miyapur up to Patancheru.

Reddy said Corridor-I is on one of the busiest as the city grew mainly along NH-9 between Patancheru/Miyapur on the Pune/Mumbai road and LB Nagar/Vanasthalipuram on the Vijayawada/Chennai road.

Currently, with about 10,000 to 20,000 vehicles plying every hour on this route. Traffic experts have projected that if a rail-based mass transit system is not built, the already low average vehicle speed, which is around 11 kmph now, will come down further and the NH is likely to get grid-locked.

In coordination with authorities of the National Highway Authority of India and different wings of the state government, the following important metro rail traffic facilitation works have either been completed or are going on at a brisk pace:

Widening of carriage way by 5 metres (one and a half lanes) on either side of the NH between Miyapur and Bharat Nagar (`17.5 crore) and between LB Nagar and Malakpet (Rs16.5 crore).