Chandigarh Administration mulls shorter route to airport from Sector 48

Dushyant Singh Pundir

Chandigarh, March 8

In order to cut travel time, the UT Administration is considering providing a shorter road to the airport from the Sector 48 side. It would save commuters’ time by more than 20 minutes as the total distance would be reduced from 14.5 km to 3.5 km.

The new route would start from Junction 63 in Sector 48 and after passing through the villages of Faidan and Jagatpura, it would connect to the airport road along the boundary of the airport.

According sources, the UT Administration would hold talks with the Punjab Government for the acquisition of land that falls in Jagatpura village for the construction of a wide road.

UT Adviser Dharam Pal had in December last year directed the Deputy Commissioner (DC) and the UT Chief Engineer to prepare a report on alternative shorter routes to the international airport from Chandigarh.

To reduce the road distance, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had recently decided to conduct a feasibility study on the connectivity to the airport from the Purv Marg side near Sector 48. The road will run through the Jagatpura area.

In its earlier recommendations, the committee had stated that it was aware that a short approach road towards the airport was functional in the past. “But now, around 30 km extra need to be covered as the entry has been shifted to the other side and reaching it is time consuming,” said the panel. In response to the recommendations of the committee, the MHA submitted that three alternative approaches were suggested in the Chandigarh Master Plan, 2031. These alternatives were discussed at various meetings which failed to reach a conclusion.