Rs. 128 billion earmarked for 2011:

More investments to improve roads

by Uditha KUMARASINGHE

The public investment on roads has been increased from Rs. 18.8 billion to Rs. 100.4 billion from 2005 to 2009.

This investment has taken the country towards a modern road network with the completion of 2,900 km of national highways, 1,706 km of provincial roads and 35,755 km of rural roads.

According to Mahinda Chinthana - Vision for the Future, the development policy framework of the Government of Sri Lanka issued by the Finance Ministry, the public investment on roads within the next five-year period is expected to gather momentum with the investment of Rs. 128 billion this year, increasing to Rs. 174 billion by 2013. A public investment level of Rs. 175-200 billion will be sustained thereafter to develop and maintain the modern road network.

Sri Lanka's road network consists of 116,113 kms which are divided into national, provincial, rural and other roads in terms of who is responsible for them. Therefore, the Government has accorded priority to improving the entire network of roads in the country with modern technology from 2011 to 2020.

Meanwhile, the current level of the road network will be evaluated and a multi-faceted approach will be adopted for its development. This approach includes road planning and engineering, investment and financial analysis, economic evaluation and traffic engineering.

According to the development policy framework, nearly 90 percent of passengers and 98 percent of freight are carried by roads.

The network's density is among the highest in Asia, as the ratio of road kilometres to population exceeds the related indicators in the neighbouring countries.

The Government will develop the expressways with a well-connected national road network as the backbone of the movement of inputs and outputs of economic activities.

The Colombo-Katunayake Expressway, Outer Circular Highway and Colombo-Matara expressway are expected to be fully completed by 2013. In addition, the Colombo-Kandy Expressway, the Northern Expressway (Ambepussa-Jaffna) and the Dambulla-Trincomalee Expressway will also be constructed.

This will be a prelude to a new era of connectivity between the regions of the country.

The Government has also decided to extend the Southern Expressway from Matara to Hambantota to improve the connectivity between Western and Southern Provinces.