Lucknow/Delhi: The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs on Wednesday approved the 118-Km long Kanpur-Kabrai (Mahoba district) expressway, a greenfield corridor that is going to bring down the commute timing between the two cities by half.Presently it takes four hours to commute between Kanpur and Mahoba via the 127-km-long National Highway 34.The access-controlled corridor would be developed with a budget of Rs 7,145 crore.National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) officials said the new high-speed corridor will also bring down the overall commute time between Kanpur and Bhopal as well as between Lucknow and Bhopal.Director, NHAI’s Kanpur project implementation unit, Pankaj Yadav, said: “At present it takes 12 to 13 hours from Kanpur and 15 to 17 hours from Lucknow to reach Bhopal. Through the upcoming expressway, the commute time to Bhopal would reduce by at least four to six hours from the two cities.”The official added that work is underway in neighbouring Madhya Pradesh to develop high-speed corridors between Chhatarpur, Sagar and Bhopal, and the objective is to link Bhopal and Lucknow.The existing NH 34 between Kanpur and Kabrai is just two lanes wide and does not have a median all along the route. The upcoming four-lane expressway would run almost parallel to it and provide a 60m wide carriageway to the motorists to maintain increased speed with safety.With the rate of accidents increasing on NH 34, which was originally designed to manage a traffic flow of up to 10,000 passenger cars in a day and currently facilitates movement of 25,000 vehicles, providing an alternative was deemed essential.“It was difficult to widen the existing corridor as enforcing diversions during civil work would only lead to bottlenecks on the two-lane stretch. And since close to 7,000 permanent structures (shops, houses, buildings, complexes) have been established along the road, the large-scale demolition drive could have resulted in law and order situations,” said a consultant working on the alignment of the project.The expressway would attract motor vehicles from NH 34, NH 35 (Varanasi-Banda-Kabrai route), four state highways, Bundelkhand Expressway and the under-construction Kanpur ring road.Also, economic activity in the region is expected to go up since 16 industrial zones or areas stand to benefit owing to the improved connectivity. Officials said the tender document is going to be floated within the next few weeks to shortlist the construction companies.
