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KARACHI, Jan 7: The city government’s two major projects — FTC Flyover and Sharea Quaideen Flyover — will finally take off within two months.
Both the projects which are aimed at easing congestion and ensuring smooth flow of traffic on the city’s 14-km-long Sharea Faisal were given a green signal recently after some modifications at a high-level meeting held with Corps Commander Lt-Gen Tariq Wasim Ghazi in the chair. It was attended, among others, by the City Nazim, Naimatullah Khan, Sindh governor’s principal secretary Brig Akhtar Zamin and DCO Shafiq-ur-Rehman Paracha while a presentation of the projects was made by the city government’s EDO Transport Malik Zaheer-ul-Islam.
Though the President Pervez Musharraf had laid the foundation of the FTC Flyover in August, work on the project could not be initiated due to litigation. The issue has, however, been resolved and a fresh tender of both the flyovers will be floated by the city government’s works and service department in a couple of days. They are scheduled to be completed in two years.
Work on both the flyovers will be undertaken simultaneously, but the Sharea Quaideen Flyover will be accomplished a little earlier than the FTC flyover, the sources said.
In addition to both the flyovers, a pedestrian bridge will also be installed adjacent to the FTC Flyover.
The FTC flyover project was initially conceived by the defunct KMC about four years back at an estimated cost of Rs 150m but following some changes made in its design and also with the inclusion of some other works under Sharea Faisal’s up-gradation works, its cost has now jumped to Rs 178.89m.
The Sharea Quaideen flyover will cost Rs 132.56m and another Rs 9 million will be incurred on the improvement of roads as well as on relocation of utilities which means both the projects — FTC and Sharea Quaideen — will cost Rs434.45m.
LAND: With the modification of plans of both the projects, the city government will now be requiring additional three acres, situated just in front of the FTC and another chunk of land, measuring 1.56, located near Sharea Faisal— Sharea Quaideen intersection.
As both the piece of land belong to the Army and Cantonment Board, the Corps Commander Tariq Wasim Ghazi and Commander Karachi agreed, in principal, to surrender this land for the projects in the interest of the city.
The three acres of land which is situated in front of the FTC was initially part of Lines Area Re-development Plan (LARP) but the defunct KDA recently gave this prime land to the Army in exchange of the land which the Army surrendered to the KDA to facilitate the Preedy Street’s extension plan’s alignment work.
About the modifications in the FTC flyover, the city government’s EDO (transport and communications), Malik Zaheer-ul-Islam told Dawn that these include simultaneous improvement of three intersections of Sharea Faisal i.e. Capt Fareed Bukhari Road, Iqbal Shaheed Road and Sharea Quaideen because any improvement at just one intersection would have created traffic blockade at another adjacent intersection.
Highlighting the salient features of modifications made in the design of the FTC, he said with a view to addressing the problems in totality a semi-clover-leaf will be provided to cater to the needs of traffic turning right to and from Korangi Road; another semi-clover-leaf will be built at Sharea Quaideen intersection for the traffic taking right turn to and from this road and the Sharea Faisal — Capt Fareed Bukhari Road intersection will be closed for the traffic crossing it from either side.
In addition, one more lane will be added to the Sharea Faisal i.e. from FTC to Avari Tower and at-grade intersections will be improved at FTC, Sharea Quaideen and CSD, near Kalapul.
Sharea Faisal which is considered as the VVIP Road and a major artery of the city’s road network is 14-km long (from Airport’s Star Gate to Avari Tower), has 14 major intersections (seven T-Type and seven cross-type) and the number of vehicles passing through it during 16 hours at FTC is 202198 and 95330 at Star Gate.
As far as right of way of the Sharea Faisal is concerned it varies from 150 to 240 feet, number of lanes also varies from three to four and its carriageway width ranges between 72 to 96 feet.
With the construction of both the flyovers, the EDO (Transport) hoped there will be no disruption to the traffic passing on either direction through Sharea Faisal as all the signals, presently installed at all the three intersections — Sharea Faisal-Iqbal Shaheed Road, Sharea Faisal-Capt. Fareed Bukhari Road and Sharea Faisal-Sharea Quaideen intersections will be eliminated.
To a question, the EDO said a survey of the sites of the flyovers for identifying diversion of traffic during the flyover’s construction work was being carried out to avoid any traffic chaos.
