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ORR: The Roads Of Destiny
Posted by Pradeep Sadanapalli | November 18, 2008 | 5,637 views
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Photo courtesy: telugulo.com
The phase I of the Outer Ring Road project is completed(NOTE by Blog Admin: Only 4-lanes are open for traffic at this time) and awaiting inauguration. Work on the longer, phase II is being coordinated by the HGCL (Hyderabad Growth Corridor Limited) and is expected to be completed in the next three years. Designed to decongest the city and give a boost to its infrastructure, this Ring Road does Hyderabad proud and takes it a step further towards becoming a major metro, writes Swayambhu Bhattacharya.
Aring road refers to a road that envelopes the periphery or inner periphery of cities.Worldwide,growing cities find it convenient to define their periphery with an outer ring road that connects their suburbs. In Hyderabad the Outer Ring Road (ORR) was envisioned as early as 1995, as a road-cum-area development project around the urban settlements in the Hyderabad Metropolitan area. Also, it would act as a bypass for the through traffic on national and state highways; preventing movement of commercial heavy vehicles in the city and thereby reduce traffic bottlenecks and accidents.
The Hyderabad Outer Ring Road had been designed to be an eight-lane fully access controlled Expressway with two lane service roads on both sides. The expressway will cover around 66 metres and a balance right of way (125 metres) to provide ramps at interchanges, service roads, utility ducts, rail corridor and so on, wherever necessary. The roads are being designed for an optimum speed of 120 kmph, and an absolute minimum of 100kmph.With all this,the ORR will provide orbital linkage
to radial arterial roads and create options for development of the further satellite townships along its route.
The Land Use of the entire growth corridor has been classified as Multipurpose Use Zone (Multipurpose zone refers to residential projects, new and existing), excluding the areas specifically earmarked for roads; open space; recreational space; Public Utilities and Amenities zone. Commercial activity, barring industries, is permitted at all locations where the road width is 18 metres or more.
Builders and developers have received incentives from the government for carrying out social housing norms in residential layouts under the jurisdiction of ORR growth corridor zone. These incentives include a total waiver of fees and development charges made by the urban development authorities for EWS plot units.Again, in case of LIGs, the charges to be paid are a nominal 25 per cent of existing rates. The ORR project is proposed to be implemented in two phases. The phase I has been projected to connect Gachibowli to Shamshabad.The expressway on this corridor will have six lanes along the 24 km stretch,and the cost is approximated at Rs. 699 Crores.The phase II is intended to connect Narsingi, Kollur, Patancheru, Medchal, Shameerpet, Peddamberpet, Turkayamjal and Shamshabad with a eight lane access controlled expressway, 138 Km long. The estimated cost of this project is Rs. 2500 Crores.
ORR Phase-I Map:
Photo courtesy: Times of India
According to Rahul Bojja, project director and special collector, Outer Ring Road Project, efforts to complete ORR on time have been thwarted several times by problems related to previously existent settlements.A majority of the problems,apparently, have been faced during acquisition of land. The land acquisition (LA) on Phase I (22 Km) for a total of 434 acres has been completed. The acquisition of the Phase II portion (140Km) is currently in the award stage. This phase covers about 83 villages in the adjoining Ranga Reddy District and Medak District.
Housing norms in this zone come with several restrictions and guidelines on development:
- The minimum developable independent plot size for apartment complexes and all other non-residential purposes should be 1000 square metres, no less
- The minimum layout size for residential development should be four hectares
- The minimum internal road width for layouts must be at least nine metres
- A minimum of 10 per cent of the total area has to be labeled for parks
- A minimum of 5 per cent of total area has to be reserved for housing for the Economically Weaker Sections (EWS)
- All properties adjacent to the ORR should imperatively have an open buffer (minimum building setback) of 15 metres from the ROW outer edge. Access will not be allowed onto the service roads of the ORR directly.
FOCAL POINT
“One of the major problems faced in this project happens to be land acquisition. Over the years, we have had to make necessary changes to the original blueprint. But, work is in progress and we should be able to complete the project by 2011. In fact, we’re inaugurating a part of the project on the 14th of this Month”
- Rahul Bojja, I.A.S, Project Director and Special Collector, Outer Ring Road Project
The problem with acquisition, partly, arises from the fact that unlike airport, ports, SEZs, and so on ORR requires strip acquisition. Hence, in a majority of the cases, only part holdings are lost during the acquisition process. While, the project has positively affected many rural families, the land losers are not satisfied on some count.
Consequently , the alignment of the ORR has been changed several times and is now quite different from the initial blueprint. These changes in alignment have positively affected people in some areas while ruining the possibilities in some other place. Individuals who ended up with land adjoining to the ORR profited immensely from selling their land to projects positioned along this growth corridor. The unhappy ones found nominal compensation packages under the present Land Acquisition Act.
The government had acknowledged the situation as a special circumstance and constituted a special committee under the chairmanship of the district collector of the Ranga Reddy district. The compensation packages extended by the committee under the statutory AP LA Negotiation rules for Consent Award, 1992, were however still not acceptable to the land losers.
Sentiments over the ORR project are split. While, there is obvious dissent over the delay in the project implementation, frequent changes to the master plan, loss of land, and so on; there’s also a tremendous hope at the possibility laid open by the project. Jagadishwaran Guruswamy, branch head of Knight Frank, Hyderabad says, “I just hope that the power lines,water, public transport and other such basic infrastructure are also extended to the a areas around the ORR. For instance, having Metro rail outlets around the access points of the ORR would be a great plus.”
THE ORR PROJECT
The Outer RingRoad is the orbital linkage to decongest the traffic flow on the existing major arterials. The Outer Ring Road should be viewed as road -cum- area development project since the aim is the development of well planned and and well connected Urban settlements around the Hyderabad Metropolitan area. The 159 km long ring road connects Patancheru-Shamshabad- Hayathnagar- Medchal -Patancheru providing connectivity to various state and national highways, to by pass the city of Hyderabad.
The importance of the proposed corridor:
- Relieves congestion on metropolitan area and inner ring road and meets the future demand.
- Provides orbital linkage to radial arterial roads
- Creates options for development of the further satellite townships
- Provides linkage to the proposed MRTS and bus system
- Provides quick access to the International Airport from strategic parts of the city
- Connects various new urban nodes outside the city like Hi- Tech city ,Games village, lIlT, ISB, Hardware Park, Singapore Township Financial district, etc.
The traffic studies conducted on NH-7 and NH-9 show that the road is due for 4/6 lane. The traffic movement on the existing inner ring road shows that the existing 4-lane road is inadequate for the movement of the traffic at the design level of serviceability.
Considering the anticipated growth in the region and development of the proposed satellite townships around the ring road and beyond and the traffic thereby generated, an 8-lane divided carriage way is planned for a design life of 20 years.
Finally the project concludes with development of a highway with full control of access warrants providing highway grade separations or interchanges for all intersecting highways. Once it has been decided to develop the route as an expressway all intersecting highways should be terminated, rerouted or provided with a grade separation. The proposed corridor is designed to be fully access controlled and limited access is to be provided at NH/SHI Major road crossings. 2-lane service roads designed to carry two way traffic, are proposed on both sides of the corridor. Low level underpasses are to be provided for connecting both the service roads at every 1-2 Km,where the terrain permits.
SOURCES:
Times Of India
Topics: What's UP, Travel, Govt In Action, Infrastructure |
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