Four more ORRs in Telangana on the cards

Hyderabad: The State government is planning to take up construction of Outer Ring Roads (ORRs) around four news cities in Telangana at an estimated expenditure of over Rs 11,000 crore.

Disclosing this in the Legislative Assembly during the Question Hour on Monday, Minister for Roads and Buildings Tummala Nageswara Rao said the new ORRs would be taken up around the cities of Gajwel, Mahbubnagar, Khammam and Warangal.

The Minister pointed out that due to the efforts of the Chief Minister in impressing upon the Central government, the State government succeeded in getting sanction for expansion of another 3,500 kms of national highways in the State. Keeping this in view, the State government had planned to take up the four new ORRs, the Minister said.

Replying to supplementary questions in this regard, the Minister said Rs 30 crore had been allotted for road development in Mahbubnagar, Rs 206 crore for development of Khammam-Ashwaraopet highway and Rs 669 crore for development of 69 kms of highway in Warangal district.

Congress member T Jeevan Reddy said for the expansion of highways, the required land acquisition should be made on both sides of the road instead of only one side.

The Minister explained that as per the Central government guidelines, land acquisition should be done on both sides of the roads and necessary steps should be taken to protect the trees lining the roads.

Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) member Srinivas Goud demanded that the government set up, in all the districts, one Road Development Authority as the one in Hyderabad. He also stressed the need for taking up construction of connecting roads from the cities to link with the ORRs.

Referring to the ORR in Hyderabad, he expressed concern over the numerous curves and turns in the designing of the ORR and wanted an investigation on why so many curves were designed which posed great threat to the smooth flow of traffic.