KOCHI: It is one road where the maintenance work lags on for years altogether. The critical stretch of the Kochi-Theni Greenfield Highway (NH 85) — from Kundannoor to Pettah — remains a daily nightmare for commuters, with the current work having been ‘progressing’ for nearly three years. That despite the stretch witnessing heavy vehicle flow.
During the peak hours, a serpentine queue of vehicles chokes the two-lane road. Adding to the peril, work is yet to be completed in a 20-metre section near the Nucleus Mall in Maradu, where the asphalt was removed a month ago for tile-laying. The work has been halted. The reason? The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) had begun laying interlocking tiles from both ends. But the final stage of the work was suspended because of a height difference between the two sides. Blame it on unscientific construction! “The work has remained suspended for a month though raw materials have been brought to the site,” said A B Sabu, a former standing committee chairman of the Kochi corporation.
Currently working as an executive engineer with the Greater Cochin Development Authority (GCDA), Sabu said mishaps involving two-wheelers happen there as the bare stretch catches riders unawares at night. “It has also slowed down traffic considerably,” he pointed out.
There are at least five such “cuts” within a 100-metre stretch, said Sreejith S who commutes to his workplace in Willingdon Island. “They mainly affect two-wheeler riders,” he said. When contacted, a senior NHAI official declined extensive comment, merely assuring that the “pending work will be completed soon”. However, Maradu municipality chairperson Antony Ashanparambil slammed NHAI’s approach, calling the tile replacement a “waste of money”.
“The site already had interlocking tiles in good condition. However, the NHAI indulged in a public wastage of money by replacing them unnecessarily. Instead, they should have carried out repairs on the service roads at Kundannoor junction, where the interlocking tiles have sunk. Vehicles have to negotiate undulating movement because of this, and the roads get get waterlogged quickly,” Antony said.
This is not an isolated incident. The construction of a culvert at the Tripunithura bypass junction, which should have been over in three months, stretched over two and a half years, concluded only recently. That delay, which transformed a small pothole into a dangerous pit due to a caved-in canal section, eventually required intervention from PWD Minister P A Mohamed Riyas to prompt NHAI into action, Sabu pointed out.