Over 11,000 km NHs constructed during the current financial year at an average of 35 kms/ day
New Delhi: The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has released the ratings for 18,668 km of completed 4/6 lane National Highway stretches covering 343 toll plazas. This has been done by National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) under Ministry of Road Transport & Highways (MoRTH) with a vision to improve the quality of public services. The fundamental objective of highway rating is “Minimum time with maximum safety in stress free environment” from highway users’ perspective.
Each toll plaza of highway is judged based on three major criteria such as, Efficiency, Safety and and User Services. These criteria are further divided into a total of 39 parameters which include average speed, road condition, facility for public like VUP/ PUP/ FOB, service road, delay at toll plaza, accidents, incident response time, wayside amenities, general cleanliness, etc. These criteria were framed after detailed studies held in NHAI & MoRTH before its final approval by MoRTH/ GOI. No such criteria has been developed across the globe in the past which evaluates the performance of highway from the users’ perspective, it claimed.
The Ministry stated it had also begun real-time monitoring of toll plazas across the country. “It is a simple help to improve traffic congestion problem at toll plazas/ city roads/highways by using central monitoring system along with bundle of analytics and quick decision-making outputs,” it explained while adding that this was eventually likely to facilitate saving the Commute Time, Improve Customer Experience, Save Fuel Wastage Cost and Reduce Carbon Footprint. It informed that this uses several technologies like Satellite Imagery, GIS, Remote Sensing along with a proprietary algorithm to remotely monitor the congestion status of the roads. The frequency sample of data can be as low as even 1-5min depending upon the requirements.
Speaking on the occasion, Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari said, with these technologies on ground, it will be possible to identify the lacunae in road construction and management. It will be easier to rectify the faults in a speedier way, he said, adding that with road safety in the priority, this will be helpful in mitigating the faults. He said, IIT and Engineering students will be trained and involved in this exercise. He said, FASTag issues are initial problems, and they are being solved gradually.
The Minister further informed that 11,035 km of NH had been constructed during this year, which represents a rate of 35 kms per day. The Minister reiterated his resolve to achieve the rate of 40 km per day within the balance months of this financial year.
– global bihari bureau
