Land acquisition process for the proposed Outer Ring Road (ORR) project around Kerala’s capital Thiruvananthapuram, a coastal city renowned for Sri Padmanabha Swamy Temple, is expected to gather pace as the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has issued a fresh 3A notification.

As a gazette notification issued by the ministry, the demarcation by laying stones on the land may begin soon.

“The land acquisition proceedings have already started. We will start laying stones as part of land acquisition, which will begin next week. If any objections come, we will listen and come up with a solution. The ORR will be constructed with service roads,” said P Pradeep, project director, NHAI told The New Indian Express.

The NHAI is expected to float the tender for the project this financial year. As per the DPR, the stretch passes through 31 villages.

Ring Road To Transform Capital

The Government is planning to develop ORR as four lane (expandable upto six lane) highway for a length of about 77.7 km.

It is a greenfield access-controlled project on the outer area of Thiruvananthapuram city on the eastern side only as the Arabian sea is located on the western side of this coastal city.

This project is further bifurcated into Northern Ring (29 Km) and Southern Ring (47.9 Km) alignments.

While the northern ring between Navaikulam and Thekadda, the southern ring which is further divided into two sections is between Mangalapuram and Vizhinjam.

Section-1 of the southern ring is 35.3 km long and is between Thekadda to Vizhinjam Bypass. Another section is 12.6 km long between Thekadda to Mangalapuram.

The 4-lane highway will be enhanced to six lane highway as and when the traffic count qualifies for six lane requirements.

This ORR is significant as it connects two major economic growth hubs i.e Technopark and Technocity complex on the northern side and Vizhinjam Port complex on the Southern side of Thiruvananthapuram.

Beside four lane main carriage way (expandable upto six lanes), the project includes provision of two lane service lanes on both sides and an additional two lanes for Mass Rapid Transit Systems to be built as per future need.

Special investment region

The state government plans to develop the area around the proposed ring road with designated planned development zones at select locations  earmarked for Special Invest Region (SIR).

The SIR will spread along 2.5 km on either side of the ORR and will have mixed land use, public and private land ownership.

Also it will have a Detailed Master Plan having Special Development Regulations to guide public and private development activities.

With the under-construction Vizhinjam international sea port in the Southern side of Thiruvananthapuram and developments in Techno city area on the far northern side, it is expected that there shall be strong stimulus to secondary development in support service sectors such as residential, hospitality, healthcare, education and commercial developments in the surrounding region.

Therefore, it is necessary to upgrade the road infrastructure in these areas and also create suitable logistic hubs to cater to the parking and goods handling requirements of the port bound traffic.