Nitin Gadkari shares plan to make Delhi congestion-free, says new links will halve traffic | Latest News Delhi

Union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari, at the inauguration of the Delhi sections of the Urban Extension Road-II (UER-II) and Dwarka Expressway on Sunday, said that the opening of these two links is likely to halve traffic jams in Delhi. He also outlined the Union government’s upcoming infrastructure plans to improve connectivity between high-speed corridors in Delhi-NCR, which will improve logistics in the region and reduce costs.

PM Modi, CM Rekha Gupta and Union minister Nitin Gadkari. (HT)

“The people of Delhi-NCR will get a lot of relief from these two projects. If I say that 50% of traffic jams in Delhi will reduce due to the UER-II and Dwarka Express highway, I don’t think it will be surprising,” he said.

Crediting Prime Minister Narendra Modi for directing his ministry to develop world-class infrastructure, he said, “At that time, the situation in Delhi was not good. There were traffic jams everywhere…we decided to make Delhi a world-class city and made a plan to make it congestion free.”

Gadkari said plans are underway to link UER-II with the Delhi-Katra Expressway, link Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab with the Delhi airport, and the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway with UER-II.

“The upcoming Delhi-Dehradun Expressway is also connected from UER-II. Travel time from vehicles coming from the Dehradun side to the Delhi airport will come down from 2-2.5 hours to just 45 minutes. A road link will also connect Noida, Faridabad with the Delhi-Dehradun Expressway, which will also work as a bypass for east Delhi,” the minister said.

He said that a direct link from southwest Delhi to the Noida-Faridabad road will be built, and a tunnel road connecting Shiv Murti–Mahipalpur (Dwarka Expressway) with Nelson Mandela Road (Vasant Kunj) will be built. Elevated corridors on the AIIMS-Mahipalpur-Gurugram routes will reduce snarls on the inner and outer ring roads.

Gadkari said all these road projects will also reduce the cost of logistics to make Indian goods competitive in the global market. Citing studies by multiple IITs, Gadkari said the logistics cost has reduced by 6% due to the improvement of roads and by 2026, the logistics cost will be in single digits.

The union minister said of the ₹65,000 crore worth of projects envisioned to ease congestion in Delhi, projects worth ₹48,000 crore have been completed in the past decade. He said three out of the six greenfield expressways connecting Delhi are ready, and the remaining three, including the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway, will be completed by December 2026. The other two are the Delhi-Katra Expressway and the Delhi-Dehradun Expressway. The Dwarka Expressway, Delhi-Meerut and Delhi Peripheral Ring Road have already been completed.

Recalling litigation that held up the peripheral ring road, he said: “With great difficulty, even after many problems, we completed the project, and heavy incoming traffic to Delhi was diverted.”

He said the Delhi Meerut Expressway, signal-free corridors between Mukarba Chowk and Sonepat, and Dhaula Kuan and Gurugram, eased the twin problems of pollution and congestion.

Gadkari said the two projects inaugurated on Sunday were envisioned in the Delhi Master Plan of 2001, but previous governments did not act on it.

According to details shared, the upcoming tunnel project between Shiv Murti and Nelson Mandela Marg will be 5km long, and consist of two ducts with three lanes each. It will pass under Delhi’s southern ridge at a depth of 20-40 metres. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) will provide cross-passage and lay-by zones at every 500-metre interval, according to an NHAI report. The project is likely to cost ₹3,500 crore.

The AIIMS to Mahipalpur-Gurugram elevated corridor is likely to be 20km long and cost around ₹5,000 crore.

According to an NHAI decongestion report shared with the Delhi government, the highway connecting UER-II with Delhi-Katra Expressway will be around 20 kilometres long and is likely to cost around ₹4,000 crore. Once complete, it will serve as an alternative to the NH-44.

Similarly, the UER-II extension to the Delhi-Dehradun Expressway will start from Alipur and end near Tronica City, covering around 17km. This extension is likely to cost around ₹3,350 crore and would provide faster connectivity to commuters from Haryana and Rajasthan heading towards Dehradun. “It will decongest Delhi by diverting long distance and freight traffic from central roads easing pressure on NH-48, NH-44, Ring Roads and Barapullah elevated corridor,” the report reads.

A further eastern extension of the UER-II, which will act as a new bypass for east Delhi, connecting Noida, Ghaziabad and Faridabad, will be around 65 kilometres long and ₹7,500 crore. “The highway will connect major roads such as Delhi-Dehradun Expressway, Delhi-Meerut Expressway, Noida-Greater Noida Expressway and DND-Faridabad highway. It will provide connectivity to towns such as Loni, Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Noida with North, Northwest and West Delhi,” the report reads.

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