Chenani-Nashri tunnel to be thrown open to public on Apr 2

Union road transport and highways minister, Nitin Gadkari, on Wednesday said the Chenani-Nashri road tunnel will become operational on April 2. He added that with this, the travel time between Jammu and Srinagar will be reduced by two hours.

Briefing the media in New Delhi, Gadkari said, "It will be an all-weather travel option and will bring down the distance by over 40 kilometers. On an average, this will help save fuel worth ₹27 lakh per day for vehicles plying on the Jammu-Srinagar highway."

He said Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate the tunnel on April 2. This will be Asia’s longest bi-directional tunnel.

Highlighting the tunnel’s main features, Gadkari said the ₹2,519crore all-weather tunnel is equipped with world-class safety features and has been built in a record four years.

He added that the tunnel has unique features like parallel escape tunnels with five metre carriageway and 2.50 metre vertical clearance. Apart from these, there are 29 cross-passages at a distance of every 300 metres, he said.

Once the tunnel becomes operational, it will reduce traffic jams on National Highway-1A caused by snowfall and avalanches in winter at Patnitop, he said.

The work on the twin-tube tunnel, which is part of a 286-km-long four-lane project on the JammuSrinagar highway started on May 23, 2011.