Mumbai, Oct 16 (IANS): Reliance Infrastructure Tuesday said it has begun work on widening and tolling of the 180-km-long Delhi-Agra road at a cost of Rs.2,945 crore.
The road is part of the Golden Quadrilateral and historical Grand Trunk road. It starts from Badarpur border and ends before the Yamuna river bridge of Agra city, connecting major tourist destinations like Surajkund, Badkhal Lake and the ISKCON, Banke Bihari and other major temples of Mathura and Vrindavan.
"Once the four-to-six lane widening work of Delhi-Agra road is over, the corridor will start handling 70,000 vehicles per day from existing 17,000 vehicles per day," Sudhir R. Hoshing, CEO (Roads), said in a statement.
The project involves construction and renovation of 16 flyovers, two overpasses, 14 vehicular underpasses, eight bridges on service road and 10 pedestrian underpasses.
When completed, commuters would be able to use the road at almost half the tolling charges as compared to the Yamuna Expressway.
"A car would have to pay Rs.80 for a single trip, but local residents could use this corridor any number of times in a month for Rs.200 only. Commuters travelling from T3 international airport to Agra on RInfra's Gurgaon-Faridabad-Delhi-Agra road will spend Rs.196 on tolling, compared to Rs.347 if they travel on Yamuna expressway, thereby saving almost 50 percent on their tolling charges," said the company.
The project is being executed on DBFOT (Design, Build, Operate, Finance and Transfer) basis under the aegis of the National Highways Authority of India.
R-infra has the concession to construct, operate and maintain the road for a period of 26 years.