Eastern Peripheral Expressway | Kundli-Ghaziabad-Palwal | 6 lanes | Proposed

[Abhishek901]

Eastern Peripheral Expressway or Kundli-Ghaziabad-Palwal expressway is one of the two semicircular expressways which will form a third ring road around Delhi along with Western Peripheral Expressway (or KMP expressway) to decongest Delhi from traffic entering and bypassing the city through National highways.

The complete peripheral road will connect following radial highways: NH-1, 2, 8, 10, 24, 58, 91, SH-57, Yamuna/Taj expressway, Ganga expressway, Hindon expressway among others.

Fact file of Eastern Peripheral Expressway

• Length - 135 km

• Lanes - 6, expandable up to 8 in future

• Areas covered - Sonepat, Faridabad (Haryana), Baghpat, Ghaziabad, Gautam Budh Nagar (UP)

• Speed limit - Designed for 120 km/hr

• Expected vehicular movement - 1,00,000 vehicles per day by 2021

• Project cost - Rs. 3000 crores

• Interchanges - On intersections with NH-1, NH-2, NH-24, NH-58, NH-91, SH-57, Hindon Expressway, Yamuna Expressway

• Bridges and Underpasses - 3 river bridges (2 over Yamuna, 1 over Hindon), 43 other bridges, 59 underpasses

• Toll Plazas - 2

• Project duration - 3.5 years

• Concession period - 25 years including construction period

• Status - Yet to be awarded

[Abhishek901]

Old news

Two high-speed corridors, which will significantly de-clog Delhi's internal roads of outbound traffic and trucks, are likely to be ready by 2012. While the western peripheral expressway (Kundli-Manesar-Palwal) is scheduled to be completed by the end of next year, the eastern peripheral expressway (Kundli-Ghaziabad-Palwal) will be complete by mid 2012.

The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) recently held the pre-bidding conference for the second project and officials said that the work on this stretch will start by June-July 2009. The country’s eight leading bidders shortlisted for the project participated in the conference. NHAI officials said the bidding process would be completed by the end of 2008. ‘‘We will give six months time to the selected bidder for the financial closure for this Rs 2,675-crore project.

Over 80% of the land acquisition for this new alignment has been completed,’’ said a senior official. The 135-km long access controlled expressway to be built on build-operation-transfer basis (BOT) takes off from NH-1 in Kundli (Haryana), crosses Yamuna river near Mawikalan, river Hindon near Sharfabad, NH-58 near Duhai, NH-24 near Dasna, NH-91 near Beelakbarpur, Kasna-Sikandrabad road near Sirsa, re-crosses Yamuna near Fajjupur Khadar, Atali-Chinsa near Maujpur and meets NH-2 beyond Palwal. It will pass through five districts — Sonipat, Faridabad in Haryana and Baghpat, Ghaziabad and Gautam Budh Nagar in Uttar Pradesh.

NHAI officials said the speed limit for this green field project would be 120 kmph. The project includes construction of three major bridges — two across Yamuna and one across Hindon river besides 43 other bridges over canals and drains. Nevertheless, there will be as many as 59 underpasses for the safe movement of pedestrians. For locals, the developer will construct service roads of about 90 km, which will provide connectivity between different areas along the expressway.

The 135.6-km long western peripheral expressway, being built at investment of Rs 2,545 crore starts from NH-1 near Kundli (Sonipat) crossing NH-10 at west of Bahadurgarh, crossing NH-8 at Manesar (Gurgaon) and joining NH-2 near Palwal (Faridabad).

Source

[Abhishek901]

Even though the Supreme Court has extended the deadline for completion of Eastern Peripheral Expressway (EPE) to 2011 end, the project is set to get delayed further with the ministry of road transport and highways cancelling the single bid option for the same. The expressway connecting Kundli, Ghaziabad and Palwal is aimed at making Delhi roads free of ‘undesired’ trucks and inter-state traffic.

According to ministry officials, there will be a re-bidding for the project and it is in their ‘‘priority list’’. They added that to reduce the total project cost, the ministry would re-structure the project. Nevertheless, the other half of the ring-expressway around Delhi to declog the capital — western peripheral expressway (WPE) — will miss July 30 deadline and the concessionaire, KMP Expressway Ltd now claims the project will be completed by Commonwealth Games.

Officials said that the re-structuring and re-bidding process might take six more months, thereby resulting in further delay of EPE. They are also skeptical about the 135 km expressway project to be unviable for developers since the re-bidding has to follow new toll policy. According to the new policy, toll amount will increase significantly, which officials claimed, might discourage the traffic to use the road.

The cancellation of the bid has come as a surprise to many considering the Central government’s submission before the Supreme Court last January, saying, ‘‘The original date of submission of bids was October 20, 2008 and in view of the poor response from shortlisted bidders, it was extended five times up to December 23, 2008 and even then only a single bid was received by the deadline.’’ It had further stated, ‘‘The process of seeking approval of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs for opening the single bid has been initiated in order to avoid delays…’’

Ministry officials said that though in cases of existing roads, increase in toll rate brings more revenue since the traffic taking that stretch has no other option, but the same doesn’t work in case of new alignment projects. ‘‘The traffic growth is only a projection. Vehicle users consider the toll amount and time factor while deciding a route. If they are charged more, they will not take that road. Long-distance drivers will try to escape paying the toll and take alternative route while car owners will completely avoid the road,’’ a senior ministry official said.

He added that since the EPE was a composite project and was a part of the proposed expressway ring around Delhi, steep increase in toll would mean that thorough traffic between NH-1 (Kundli) and NH-2 (Palwal) would take the WPE. ‘‘Thorough traffic, which uses the entire 135 km stretch, could generate 40% revenue for EPE. If the project were awarded according to the old toll policy, it would have been less than the toll to be charged by WPE,’’ an official said.

Moreover, the logic of re-structuring does not seem to have gone down well. ‘‘Any proposal to bring down the 6-lane project to 4-lane makes no sense. All highways including NH-1, NH-58, NH-24, NH-21, Taj and Ganga expressways are going to be of 6-8 lanes. So, how can anyone visualize the expressway crossing through them to be 4-lane?’’ asked an official.

The SC had cleared construction of the two expressways to reduce the movement of trucks on Delhi roads at night, which create major traffic problem besides causing fatal accidents.

Source July 23, 2009.

[Abhishek901]

Delhi will have to wait for over four years to get rid of the killer and polluting trucks that use the city as a thoroughfare. The Eastern Peripheral Expressway (EPE) that would have prevented trucks from entering the city in transit will be delayed as the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is all set to re-invite bids for the 135 km road. With a revision in the toll policy due any time soon, the toll amount is also expected to be higher than what was originally proposed.

Construction of the other half of the road Western Peripheral Expressway (WPE) is already underway. It has already missed the July 30 deadline and the revised deadline is December 2010. EPE and WPE are supposed to make a composite ring around the city. As per the new policy, toll will be higher on EPE than on WPE which goes against the suggestion of the SC appointed monitoring committee to keep the toll on the two roads the same.

"Since we are going to re-invite bids for the project, there is no question of going by the old toll policy. Nothing much should be read into this. I can't recollect the details of the monitoring committee's suggestion,'' said road, transport and highways minister Kamal Nath.

Sources said the total project cost of EPE has also been increased to approximately Rs 3,000 crore from the earlier Rs 2,675 crore. Officials of road, transport and highways ministry (MoRTH) said that due to this increase, the government now has to shell out Rs 130 crore extra as aid to the developer as viability gap fund (VGF).

Although earlier NHAI had received a single bid for the project despite extending its deadline five times, the bid was rejected by the ministry. Ministry sources said that NHAI had requested the ministry to open the single bid.

The Supreme Court appointed monitoring committee for the twin expressways had supported this. This had happened just before the Lok Sabha elections and a decision on whether to go ahead with the single bidder was put off for a later date to be considered by the new cabinet.

However, after the change of guard in the ministry in UPA-2, the single bid was rejected by the ministry. It also decided to re-bid the project after restructuring it and as per the new toll policy which was notified in December 2008. Sources say that according to the new toll policy, toll charges on the EPE will be almost one and a half times higher than that of the WPE because it has huge bridges and major bypasses. They added that this could result in major shifting of the traffic between Kundli and Palwal from the EPE to the WPE thereby congesting WPE needlessly.

Source: Times of India Nov 29, 2009

[Abhishek901]

A monitoring committee set up by the Supreme Court to oversee the Eastern Peripheral Expressway (EPE) project — a road around Delhi to decongest city — is likely to fix the toll rate for this stretch on Monday. The committee will also decide how long people will have to pay the toll tax.

The committee had earlier recommended the toll rate to be similar to that of Western Peripheral Expressway (WPE) — the other half of the peripheral ring around Delhi — for fair competition. But NHAI floated the tender based on the new toll rate, which is about 30% higher than that of the WPE.

NHAI officials had earlier recommended the project was viable with 20 years toll collection period but the tender recently fixed this period for 25 years.

The committee, headed by the road secretary, has chairman of the environment pollution (prevention and control) authority Bhure Lal as one of the members. "The committee will take up all issues related to the project and has the power to recommend to the ministry to reduce the toll rate and also the concession period," said an official.

Times of India. Jan 18, 2010

[Abhishek901]

[bharatiya]

With the completion of the WPE and EPE, Delhi will have its 2nd signal-free Ring Road. The difference between this one and the ORR is that I'm assuming there's more limited access here (example. 2-3 wheelers)

[qwertyasd]

There is no problem with high toll - just set a higher toll for entering Delhi and nobody will try to take that "shortcut."

[Abhishek901]

Originally Posted by bharatiya

With the completion of the WPE and EPE, Delhi will have its 2nd signal-free Ring Road. The difference between this one and the ORR is that I'm assuming there's more limited access here (example. 2-3 wheelers)

3rd one in fact. There are 2 ring roads in Delhi, one of which is alrady signal free and other one will become signal free in few years. Since this is an expressway, it will definitely allow limited access and higher speeds.

Originally Posted by qwertyasd

There is no problem with high toll - just set a higher toll for entering Delhi and nobody will try to take that "shortcut."

Problem is not entering Delhi for short cut. Problem is the difference in toll rates between WPE and EPE. Traffic going from Kundli to Palwal will have 2 options but people will choose WPE because of lower toll rate.

And of course vehicles entering Delhi should be tolled to avoid toll leakage.

[Effer]

I really hope the expressways get built. Delhi really needs this.

[Abhishek901]

With the construction of the two expressways around Delhi — for trucks to pass without entering the city — getting delayed, the capital will have to put up with unwanted trucks crowding city roads during night.

The time overrun on the 270-km expressway network has resulted in major escalation of land acquisition costs as well as project costs — and this has led to an increase in the toll charge.

The KMP Expressway (also called Western Peripheral Expressway), being built by Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation (HSSIDC), missed its original completion deadline of July 2009. Now, the deadline has now been pushed to December 31 this year. The tender for the other bypass — the Eastern Peripheral Expressway — is yet to be awarded by National Highways Authority of India (NHAI).

Bhure Lal, chairman of Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority (EPCA) and member of the Supreme Court-appointed monitoring committee, told the SC that NHAI had set March 2014 — as against October 2010 — as the deadline for completion of the project. Lal has submitted to SC that NHAI was directed to adopt new toll rules against the directive of the monitoring committee to keep the toll rates of EPE and KMP expressway same. "The ministry also directed NHAI to increase the concession period from 20 years to 25 years and the time period for construction from 36 months to 42 years," the report said.

Sources said that after a meeting of the monitoring committee last month on the adoption of toll rules, the panel proposed to put the case before Public Private Partnership Appraisal Committee (PPPAC). NHAI officials said the toll on EPE would be significantly higher in comparison to the KMP expressway, which was not the case when the projects were conceived. This would force about 30% of the traffic on EPE between Kundli and Palwal to the KMP expressway. Rough estimates suggest that to cover the same distance a truck on the EPE will have to pay Rs 300 more than what it will have to pay if it takes the KMP.

As per a detailed submission by R B Singh, member secretary of the MC states, 1,310 hectare of land out of the required 1,350 hectare for the EPE has so far been acquired. The report mentions that pre-qualification of bidders had also been completed. The original date for submission of bids was October 20, 2008. Though the bid date was extended five times, only a single bid was received. "The approval of Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) was sought for opening the bid. Meanwhile, the general elections were announced and the cabinet secretariat returned the proposal stating that the matter might be placed before CCEA," stated the report.

The new government in the state rejected the single bid. "Had the project been awarded by 2008 end, there would have been significant progress in the construction work," said an NHAI official.

The situation is also critical in the case of KMP expressway. Though the project was awarded in November 2005 for a concession period of 23 years and nine months, including three years of construction period, it had achieved work progress of 32.20% by November 2009, as per the managing committee submission to the apex court. The report stated that the progress of work should have been 52.6% by November 2009 as per the revised deadline of the project.

The report also mentioned that the monthly work progress of three-four months preceding November 2009 was 1.4%, 1.5%, 1.7%, 2.77% and 3.03%. H S Kohli, chairman of KMP Expressways, said the actual progress is more in comparison to the monitoring committee report. "We are sure of improving the work progress by 5% in next couple of months and hope to complete the project by this year end," he added.

Times of India

[pgarg2000]

Any update on KGP ? Has the contract been given to any firm and if so what is the status on this ?

[SSCaddict]

after searching 15 min i found this to be latest(21June,2010) according to which still only reliance infra is the sole bidder

http://www.businessreviewindia.in/in...ted-fresh-bids

[anidel]

Originally Posted by SSCaddict

after searching 15 min i found this to be latest(21June,2010) according to which still only reliance infra is the sole bidder

http://www.businessreviewindia.in/in...ted-fresh-bids

No problem, here is latest.

Tardy construction work of expressways miffs Haryana CS

Chandigarh, Aug 16 (PTI) A top Haryana government official today expressed unhappiness over "tardy" progress of construction work of eastern and western peripheral expressways.

Directing officials concerned to expedite the work, Chief Secretary Urvashi Gulati said the Western Peripheral Expressway between Kundli and Palwal and Eastern Peripheral Expressway from Kundli to Palwal via Ghaziabad and Noida are projects of national interest. She said these two high-speed corridors will significantly decongest internal roads of outbound traffic and trucks in the cities it would be passing through. All efforts, including increasing manpower, supervisory staff and additional machinery, should be made to ensure speedy completion of the two expressways -- both 135-km long, Gulati told a meeting here.

She also called for close monitoring of the project and to convene monthly meetings to oversee the progress, an official spokesman quoted her as saying. Gulati also directed the concessionaire to submit a detailed programme for completion of the balance work along with action plans to cover up the shortfall. For three RoBs on Delhi Ambala section, RoB on Delhi Rohtak Railway Line and Delhi Rewari Railway Line, the concessionaire had submitted all the drawings to the Railways and the latter had approved them, the spokesman said.

http://ibnlive.in.com/generalnewsfee...cs/234202.html

[Abhishek901]

Even that's not sufficient. Don't know why NHAI is sleeping over this.

[SSCaddict]

Originally Posted by anidel

http://ibnlive.in.com/generalnewsfee...cs/234202.html

i also found this but the problem is this is half right it mentions that the eastern exp. is under construction but actually it is not u/c even the tender is not still out

[SSCaddict]

Originally Posted by Abhishek901

Even that's not sufficient. Don't know why NHAI is sleeping over this.

NHAI announced in 2005 that this will be finished before CWG

[pgarg2000]

Does anyone know where will be the exit(s) on the e-way for Faridabad. I know it will meet on NH-2 at Palwal but I am there will be more exits for faridabad.

Will taking this e-way be a better option for someone going from FBD to Panipat ?

[Abhishek901]

Originally Posted by pgarg2000

Does anyone know where will be the exit(s) on the e-way for Faridabad. I know it will meet on NH-2 at Palwal but I am there will be more exits for faridabad.

Will taking this e-way be a better option for someone going from FBD to Panipat ?

It will have very limited exits, at least initially. So there might be only 1 exit from Faridabad.

[SSCaddict]

Eastern peripheral expressway back on the block

After two unsuccessful attempts during the economic crisis, the Union road transport and highways ministry has, once again, planned to come out with a fresh request for qualification (RFQ) for the Rs2,700 crore eastern peripheral expressway project in New Delhi.

According to officials from the transport ministry, certain new initiatives have been taken to generate investors’ interest this time. Toll rates have been capped and concession period has been increased to attract investors to take up the project.

Consultants preparing the detailed project report have been advised to study the feasibility, considering the concession period as 23.5 years, instead of the earlier 20 years.

Regarding the tolling issue, the ministry felt that imposing a cap on toll was important, as rates on the eastern peripheral expressway should not exceed the maximum toll rate being charged on Western peripheral expressway, which is a similar facility.

“In view of the modifications, further changes are required, particularly in view of the proposed modification in the concession period. About the proposal of capping the rate, NHAI has been suggested to prepare a note for the department of legal affairs, seeking its opinion on the issue, as well as, to seek approval of the finance ministry,” said an official.

The 135-km expressway starts at Kundli on NH-1, passes through Bagpat, bypassing Ghaziabad, Gautam Budh Nagar, and Faridabad and terminates at Palwal on NH-2. Of the total 1680 ha of land to be acquired, 1360 hectare (92%) has already been acquired and acquisition of the remaining land is in progress.

When the project was put on the bidding block for the first time in 2008, Reliance Infrastructure emerged as the sole bidder for the project. The government restructured the project and put it yet again on the bidding block in April 2009. Single bidder scenario emerged yet again, only to be scrapped later.

source