Invest Karnataka 2016: At Rs 8,000 crore, Bengaluru-Mysuru Road will be superway'

Bengaluru: Union transport minister, Nitin Gadkari announced on Wednesday that the state  and Union governments had agreed to build an ambitious six- lane access-controlled highway between Bengaluru and Mysuru.

Work on the highway could begin by the year end, he revealed, speaking at an interactive meeting organized by the Namma Bengaluru Foundation. 

“We need to complete all the formalities at the earliest and start the work at least by the year-end. The project cost is estimated to be Rs 8,000 crore. It will be a toll road, but a service road will be built on both the sides,” he explained, adding that educational and hospital clusters would be developed near the bypasses of the new highway.

The minister also revealed that the  National Highway 209 between Bengaluru and Dindigal would be widened at an estimated cost of '850 crores.

“We plan to widen the Dabaspet –Hoskote  road  too at an estimated cost of Rs 2,000 crores and also widen the Tumukuru-Nelamangala stretch of NH 4, ” he said.

In other plans, he said the Union government was considering a proposal to build an expressway between Bengaluru and Chennai.

“Traffic jams are a problem faced by all the metro cities including Bengaluru. I was personally stuck in a traffic jam in Bengaluru recently. The situation is the same in Delhi. Elevated roads, and ring roads are the solution. But the need of the hour is integration of all modes of transport,” he emphasised.

Requesting Union minister, Ananth Kumar and MP,  Rajeev Chandrashekhar to bring a delegation to Delhi with concrete proposals for the state, he promised to hold meetings with all the ministries concerned to address them.

Accusing corrupt RTO officials of misleading state transport ministers, Mr. Gadkari  claimed he was not able to table the new transport policy as a result.

“But I am sure that this bill will be approved in the coming Budget session of  parliament,” he said, also promising a comprehensive policy on taxi aggregator service providers.

Earlier in the day Mr. Gadkari reviewed several projects with state PWD officials.