What’s Fixed?

Kathmandu, September 11:

Valley denizens have surely started going nuts about the daily traffic snarls in almost every part of the city of late. However, here’s high quality news for those who have been hacked off by the roads always chock-a-block with vehicles.

The Department of Roads (DoR) has started constructing and repairing roads along Bagmati corridors as alternative routes for those wanting to avoid the heaving regular ones. The DoR recently repaired a 940-metre-long and seven-feet-wide road from the Bagmati bridge at Pingalasthan joining another bridge at Bhimsengola. The road that runs along the Bagmati river has not only

served as a short-cut for people headed for Bhimsengola, but also helped them avoid sodden regular roads.

The Bagmati Sewerage Improvement Project had originally constructed the road and the DoR blacktopped it and repaired some “weak” sections as the place where the road now stands was a garbage dumping site earlier.

Using the road during the monsoons was almost impossible given the number of potholes that dotted it.

A total of Rs 10 million was spent on the repair work. Ayodhya Prasad Shrestha, the chief of the Division Road Office at the DoR, said that the road was blacktopped after repairing some “weak” sections. He, however, added that the road has been temporarily repaired and that more work remains to be carried out.

“Until and unless all the weak sections on the road are identified and reconstructed, the DoR efforts’ would be useless and the blacktop will not last long,” he said.

Who is responsible?

To ease traffic congestion in the valley, we have plans to construct roads along the Bagmati corridor. A 940-metre long road was recently renovated in Kathmandu ward

no-9 that links Pingalasthan to Bhimsengola. The road was earlier constructed in an area where garbage used to be dumped and this would mean that some sections of the road may sink after some time. Therefore, we have only temporarily repaired the road and we will be doing more after all the weak sections are identified.