Connecting people, easy access
Road development:
With the aim of providing a
satisfactory transport service towards a sustainable
mobility, along with the vision of 'Mahinda Chinthana', Sri
Lankan Government has already allocated a mammoth sum of
484,378 million rupees for the development of road systems
in our island.
 Using such an allocation effectively several mega
projects on express highway constructions, rehabilitation of
urban and rural road structures are already under way. The
Finance Ministry statistics state that in year 2007 the road
sector has contributed 1.99% to GDP.
Three billion rupees and 25 billion rupees were invested
in the year 2005 and 2006 respectively. And several other
mega projects will also be implemented very soon.
The Southern Express Highway, which is already under
construction, will be fully completed by year 2011. At
present, 25% of the construction of Kottawa to Kurundugaha
Hethepma is already completed and from Kurundugaha Hethepma
to Matara 70% of the construction is completed.
In addition to the Southern Expressway, construction of
the Colombo-Kandy and Colombo-Katunayake expressways are on
progress.
Construction of the Manampitiya Bridge over the Mahaweli
River in the Polonnaruwa district is complete. This is the
longest bridge in the island, 302 meters long and 10.4
meters wide. Construction of Manampitiya Bridge greatly
assists the connectivity between the Eastern and North
Central provinces.
Constructions of the Katugasthota Bridge in Kandy,
connecting the Kandy - Jaffna road across the Mahaweli River
and of the Bentota Bridge on the Colombo-Galle-Hambantota-Wellawaya
road are rapidly progressing.
|
President opens the new Manampitiya bridge across
Mahaweli river in Polonnaruwa |
Already around 900 kilometres of A and B grade roads are
developed and upgraded including access roads to the
Southern Expressway and many roads connecting places across
the country.
With the cost of around 25 million rupees, road
development projects are on process in the Eastern province
connecting its main cities reducing disparities in regional
development.
The total length of roads under this project is roughly
500 kilometres. Twenty flyovers and interchanges, enabling
easy access to the City of Colombo and other major urban
centres, will be constructed in Colombo and suburbs aiming
to reduce the high traffic congestion in the metro area.
Development of provincial roads of Western,
North-Western, North-Central and Uva - by 2008 with a cost
of 10,671 million rupees. Development of Sabaragamuwa and
Central provincial roads, at an estimated cost of 9,652
million rupees by year 2009.
Reconstruction of Tsunami affected roads by the year 2009
at a cost of 21,577 million rupees.
(DY)
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