February 19: The Department of Roads has said that the process of expanding the Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel road section along the Araniko Highway has started. According to the department, the Suryabinayak-Sindhuli-Bardibas Project has started collecting details for the expansion of road in two phases.

After calling for tender bids last September, the government signed separate agreements to complete the expansion of the road section, which was built 25 years ago, in two phases. The deadline for the expansion work is three years.

In the first phase, the road will be expanded from Sanga to Dhulikhel and then from Sanga to Suryabinayak in the second phase, the project office said.

Out of the total 15.5 km road to be expanded from Suryabinayak to Dhulikhel, Lama Construction has won the contract to complete the 8.4 km road from Sanga to Dhulikhel. The contract is worth Rs 4.5 billion, said Spokesperson for the Department of Roads, Bhimarjun Adhikari.

In the second phase, an agreement has been signed to complete the 7.5 km Suryabinayak-Sanga road at the cost of over Rs 3.8 billion, said the department.

The project office has written letters to four local levels within the project site to help collect details about the road in line with the set standards.

Removing buildings and structures built violating the road standards has begun, said the project office. The road will be expanded to six lanes, said the project's senior divisional engineer Radhika Prajapati.

After the completion of the road expansion work, it is expected to ease traffic congestion, said Mayor of Banepa Municipality Shanti Ratna Kayastha.

Separate bidding will be announced to construct bridges along the road, said the project office. The estimated cost to construct bridges is Rs 9 million.

According to the detailed project report, around Rs 1 billion is required to acquire 17 ropanis of land for the road expansion project.

It may be noted that the project had issued a 35-day notice last July urging the owners to remove unauthorized structures from both sides of the highway.   

The Department of Roads had initiated the process to expand the road from Dhulikhel to Bhaktapur via Banepa some years ago taking into consideration huge traffic pressure. 

It has been learnt that the Department of Roads intensified preparation for the road expansion drive on its own using internal resources after the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) pulled out of the project. -- RSS