Work has started on a road to link New Town and Sector V and provide an alternative to the Major Arterial Road when entering the township from Salt Lake. 

This 1.5-km link road would be an extension of the ring road of Sector V (the recently beautified Godrej Waterside stretch along the bheris) and New Town’s Street number 2222 (near Balaka Abasan). The Sector V side of the road would be built by its administrative body Nabadiganta Industrial Township Authority (NDITA). On Tuesday, Housing Infrastructure Development Corporation (Hidco) began work on their end of the road.

“This road will be constructed using state-of-the art road laying techniques,” said Debashis Sen, the chairman cum managing director of Hidco. Their end of the road would be 850m long and come up near an existing steel bridge adjacent to Balaka Abasan. The Telegraph Salt Lake had reported about the new road in the April 3 article titled “On a fast track”.

The two flanks of the road would be 10.5m wide each, flanked by eight service roads of decreasing width. The road should be ready in 10 months. 

“At present, only the MAR connects New Town with Salt Lake. It had been planned around a decade back but now the number of vehicles plying on it has increased greatly and as more and more people move into New Town, a new road would be necessary,” said Sen.

The steel bridge, known locally as Lohapool, would stand for now and later get rebuilt. “That road would serve as a vital link in case of emergencies,” said Sen.

As for the NDITA end of the road, officials said a sum of Rs 6 crore had been allocated for its construction, all though work is yet to begin.

Residents welcome the move. “Once this link road is ready it would cut my daily commute time by half. I know of another route through Thakdari but it’s a narrow lane riddled with potholes. There are water bodies on the side, it is not well-lit and so driving there at night is risky,” said Vikas Agarwal, a resident of Balaka Abasan, who works in Sector V.