BBMP starts ‘rapid road’ work on pilot basis on Old Madras Road

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru:

A 500-meter stretch of Old Madras Road is being whitetopped by a technology called the ‘Rapid Road.’ The BBMP has taken up this pilot project, where it plans to embed slabs of concrete measuring 20 feet in length and five feet in width on roads that require asphalting. With the current system that the BBMP is following to white-top a road, the entire process requires at least 26 to 28 days.

The civic body needs to mill the roads, level them and then provide bituminous concrete. After this, a 21-day mandatory curing period follows. With the usage of Rapid Road technology, concrete slabs will be directly brought to the site and placed in position with the use of cranes. This method will only take a span of five days to be completed as it takes one day to lay out half a kilometer of road.

Before doing this, the civic body will take about one to two days for milling and leveling. The project will be implemented across the city after receiving feedback from motorists. While it is expected to cut construction time, motorists speculate undulation as multiple slabs are used. The cost of both methods is the same.

However, Rapid Road will have an additional transportation cost as the concrete slabs need to be brought to the site. The pilot project is happening under the partnership of UltraTech Cement, who has chosen to bear the additional costs this time around.

Other side of whitetopped roads during monsoons On how road designs affect flooding in neighbourhoods, Dr Anjali Karol Mohan, an urbanist, has explained how she has noticed issues of flooding, especially in areas that have whitetopped roads. “The level of the road has gone above the level of the houses, especially in the older parts of the city which would never be flooded,” she said.

Ideally, the contractors responsible must strip the roads of the material laid out previously and then go ahead with their asphalting work. Along with this, she encouraged the authorities to choose a previous alternative to the asphalt on the road.

Both asphalt and concrete roads are designed as impermeable membranes but when there are potholes present in asphalt roads, it leaves room for water to seep through. To counter the problem of flooding, both kinds of roads must have a good drainage system on either side.