Jalandhar: Widening of 66ft road on at slow pace, commuters at receiving end

Jalandhar, April 4

Commuters and residents of Jalandhar Heights and other localities located near 66ft road are miffed over the slow pace of road-widening work. The residents alleged that the construction work was going on in full swing ahead of the Assembly poll, but now they are clueless as to when the road will be completed.

They said despite the fact that the road caters to heavy traffic throughout the day, the work is going on at snail’s pace.

“There’s an educational institute on the same stretch, a housing society that has over 10,000 families, besides it’s the main road that leads to Pholriwal village and other localities, but still no efforts are being made to speed up the construction work,” said Mayank Joshi, a resident of Jalandhar Heights.

He said though the road-widening project began here in October-November last year, just a few months before the election, the road has been lying broken and covered with potholes for over a year.

Another resident, Balminder Kaur, said a long stretch of the road, right from the White Diamond resort to Jalandhar Heights II, has been laden with gravel. “In the name of widening project, so far only trees have been uprooted from one side of the road and a divider has been constructed till Jalandhar Heights I, the remaining work, however, still stands pending,” she said. She further said if the work continues to go on at the same speed, it would easily take another eight or nine months for the project to see the light of day.

“Drivers especially those on two-wheelers face a tough time, as the road is covered with potholes and stones scattered on its surface. Although half of the stretch from main chowk till White Diamond was recarpeted, thanks to Rahul Gandhi’s visit, however, the road ahead where construction is underway is still the same,” said Sumit Mishra, a resident of Pholriwal, who has to take this stretch for commuting to home from office.

He said the dust displaced by the vehicles has made their lives miserable and is one of the main reasons for accidents on the stretch. “Whenever a speeding four-wheeler passes from the stretch, a cloud of dust could be seen and it sometimes enters the eyes of those on two-wheeler due to which they either fell down or hit other vehicles,” he added.

MC Mayor Jagdish Raja said there were some issues in the concrete batching plant due to which work got slow in the past few days. He said a meeting was held today with members of the plant and MC officials and they have been asked to speed up the work and finish it at the earliest.