OOTY: Barely a decade ago, the Gudalur-Ooty-Mettupalaym road of the Ooty-Coimbatore NH was disfigured with potholes dotting the stretches and giving bumpy rides. There was a hue and cry then to repair and maintain this road. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) made sincere efforts to bring this busy ghat road into shape.
Now, this road between Gudalur on the Nilgiris border and Mettupalayam near Coimbatore is redesigned as NH-181 after the NHAI handed over it to the jurisdictional control of the National Highway (NH) department, and is undergoing astonishing changes with widening, strengthening and related works.
What was once thought impossible is now being made possible on the Ooty-Coimbatore NH. The narrow curves as well as the narrow road are getting widened.
The dangerous slopes along the road are being strengthened at points with huge retaining walls.
While some widening and strengthening works on the Mettupalayam and Marapalam sector along the Coonoor-Burliar slopes on this NH was completed a year ago, for the past few months, the NH administration is focusing on the Yellanalli-Thalaiyatimund sector, the Collectorate junction and Finger Post in Ooty limits. The efforts of NH have already started bearing fruit.
The NH sources said that Rs.30 crore have been allotted to carry out NH improvement works in the sector between Yellanalli-Thalaiyattimund, Collectorate junction and Finger Post in Ooty limits, together constituting for 11 kms. “A 10 ft width is the standard norms set for widening this road. Wherever it was possible it was further widened. While a few new culverts were formed, some existing bridges along the Ooty-Gudalur sector have been widened. In the next course, efforts will be made to widen the road between Yellanalli-Aruvankadu and the Coonoor sector of the Ooty-NH,” sources maintained.
Efforts will be made to widen this road between Thalaiyattimund junction and Charing Cross in Ooty in the near future.
Studies are underway to look at the possibilities of erecting a flyover between Coonoor and Kateri junction for free flow of vehicles. Likewise, a proposal to improve and widen the Mettupalayam-Sathiyamangalam-Bhavani-Erode-Karur road is under the consideration of the union government, sources added.
