Delhi-Dehradun e-way may be fully ready by Dec

New Delhi: The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) intends to make the New Delhi-Dehradun Expressway fully operational by Dec and the link from the expressway to Haridwar will be complete by May 2025, the road transport ministry officials told Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday.
The 264-km project came up for review at the monthly web-based Pragati meeting of the PM with secretaries and chief secretaries of states.Sources said Modi instructed the ministry to complete the expressway without any delay. “All pending land-related issues have been resolved. The NHAI has committed to complete the remaining work in the next four months. Since the provision of an access-controlled link from the expressway to Haridwar was made later, the NHAI will take five more months to complete that,” said a source.
After completion, the travel time from Akshardham in Delhi to Dehradun will reduce to only two and a half hours against the current six hours. Commuters can also reach Haridwar in two hours from Delhi. The access-controlled expressway has been designed for 100 kmph speed.
The expressway and the Haridwar link costing around Rs 14,285 crore has been fully funded by the govt. The project has special features, including Asia’s longest elevated wildlife corridor (12 km) and animal underpass, which will reduce man-animal conflict across the Rajaji National Park and Shiwalik Reserve forest.
Sources in NHAI said that the first leg of the expressway, from Akshardham to Eastern Peripheral Expressway (EPE) interchange, is likely to be operational by November this year, which is expected to provide relief to many from daily traffic nightmares. This stretch passes through areas including Geeta Colony, Shastri Park, Sonia Vihar in Delhi and Vijay Vihar, Kasim Vihar and Mandola in Uttar Pradesh.