Hi-tech highways to offer a smooth ride

Residents of the state capital can look forward to a smooth ride when the much awaited access-controlled outer ring road takes shape. But saying goodbye to traffic jams by driving in this fast lane would come with a price tag.

This road would prove a milestone in helping to decongest Lucknow. Users would be required to pay toll. But there would be no long queues at the toll plazas. “We will collect toll through radio frequency identification technology (RFID) tags called FASTag that would be mounted on the vehicle’s windscreen,” said chairman of the National Highways Authority of India, Raghav Chandra. He said the Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) system was gradually being introduced on all such toll plazas across the country. “We initially wanted to have dedicated lanes for such road users but the proposal was shelved because we do not have highways wide enough to introduce this facility,” he said.

The ETC lanes, he said, had already been implemented on all 45 toll plazas in UP and the NHAI had now tied up with mobile wallet company PayTM and other nationalized banks to set up clearing houses for payment by Fast Tag lane users. A Fast Tag is an electronic card mounted on the vehicle’s windscreen through which the user can do toll transaction without stopping. making the process faster and more efficient. This has many advantages like reducing congestion at plazas, saving fuel, reducing travel time and so on. The toll plazas would also have toilet blocks and wash rooms. The Fast Tag system was recommended by Nandan Nilekani Committee and the recommendations in the report were languishing for quite some time now, Chandra said. The NHAI chief said he intended to get 30 to 40% vehicles equipped with the system in two years.

“Apart from taking up plantation work in a big way under our Green Highway Mission, we have also decided to provide wayside amenities like restrooms, restaurants, repair shops, bank/ ATMs every 50 km on our highways,” he said.

The NHAI has 28 ongoing highway projects in Uttar Pradesh. A similar outer ring road project is underway in Varanasi and the blueprint of another separate four-lane expressway between Kanpur and Lucknow is also being prepared. Being designed and developed with state of the art technology and infrastructure, these projects would help reduce travel time and good connectivity would give a boost to trade and business. But speed has brought to fore a major concern: road safety. “We recorded 4.50 lakh accidents and 1.50 lakh deaths . It is a major concern. We have identified 67 such black spots (stretches which are accident prone) in UP and are taking corrective measures,” Chandra said. The engineering design flaws in the existing highways, he said, would be removed through retrofitting and by building foot over bridges and service lanes. LAND ACQUISITION A BIG PROBLEM

A major reason why highway projects in UP were languishing was acquisition of land. The NHAI said it would give compensation under the new LA Act to the land owners’ and had even offered incentive to be paid from its own coffers to government officers for the job to get the projects expedited. CS MEETS TRAINEE IAS OFFICERS

Bhatnagar met a delegation of newly appointed India administrative service officers of 2015 batch and Indian Forest Service officers of 2013 batch here on Friday. He encouraged the officers to work in an exemplary way to build a distinct identity for themselves and ensure quick redressal of problems.

He emphasised that every government department was important and officers should not hanker after being posted in a particular department. He said that it was the responsibility of each officer to ensure implementation of government schemes on priority.