Bhubaneswar, July 15: The congested and long-neglected Old Station area is being developed jointly by the city’s development authority, the public works department (PWD) and East Coast Railway (ECoR).

While preliminary work on two more platforms towards the Old Station end has begun, efforts will also be made to ensure more space to facilitate easy movement of people by removing encroachments.

The decision to develop the area was taken by the state government last week at a meeting attended by senior officials of the railways and other departments.

The Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) has been asked to transfer the roads under its jurisdiction to the PWD, which will widen them to ensure easier movement of people.

On June 9, The Telegraph had carried a report on how the connecting roads originating from NH-203 (Cuttack Road) and ending near the Old Station gate were in a bad shape because of encroachment.

The railway officials present at the meeting assured that a no-objection certification would be issued to the PWD for the development work in the Old Station area on a priority basis.

The Rail Vikas Nigam is executing the work on the two platforms.

“While PWD will develop the roads on the Old Station side, the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) and the BDA will ensure that there is no encroachment. We will carry out demolition drive and ensure that the PWD engineers face no difficulty in executing their work,” said BMC commissioner-cum-BDA vice-chairman Krishan Kumar.

A senior official of the housing and urban development department said: “The roads connecting NH-203 to the station should also be interconnected at several places so that there is no problem of congestion in future.”

Resident of Engineers’ Colony and retired professor of anthropology Bijaylaxmi Patnaik said: “The Old Station Road was lying in utter neglect for years and it is really nice to hear that the state government will take steps to develop it.”

A senior civic engineer B.C. Pradhan said: “The PWD will take up the work on a war footing. We will start the tendering process soon and once the BMC authorities hand over the roads to us, we will start the work.”

On the expansion plan, he hinted at development of the two existing roads, one starting from Pushpak Hotel and the other from Laxmisagar Square.

Once expanded, these roads will connect with roads coming from the fruit godown area in Buddha Nagar. Pradhan said he hoped that the work would begin after the Assembly session.