M.K. Raghavan, MP, has urged the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to complete the repair of Arappuzha bridge across the Chaliyar river on the Kozhikode-Palakkad Highway on a war footing.
A release quoting him said here on Sunday that traffic jams had become a regular affair on the bypass road, with vehicles moving very slowly due to the large potholes on the bridge there. The passenger car unit as per the Indian Roads Congress is that of a six-lane road here. But there was only a two-lane road on the bridge, said the MP. He pointed out that though repair works were taken up regularly earlier, the situation changed after the NHAI took over the maintenance of the bridge.
As the number of vehicles on the road is going up very fast, any delay in repair works will lead to longer traffic snarls both on the bypass road as well as in Kozhikode city. The lag in repair works of the Arappuzha bridge has been attributed to the delay in construction of the six-lane road under the NHAI. Blaming the company that had bagged contract for the six-lane road, the MP said the lethargy of the authority was complicating matters. Mr. Raghavan also sought more police personnel for traffic management on the bridge.
