Link road to decongest key Kasauli junction in works

Ambika Sharma

Solan, March 12

In a likely relief to commuters, the foundation stone for the 750-metre Shiller-Pathia-Tickethatti link road was laid by Kasauli MLA Vinod Sultanpuri in the Kasauli area today.

The link road will help commuters bypass the congested Garkhal junction while travelling to Tickethatti and other destinations like Jagjitnagar, Chabal, etc from Sanawar. Motorists have to cross the busy Garkhal junction to reach these places from Sanawar, which is lies on the periphery of Kasauli.

Commuters coming from Chandigarh and Shimla, too, use the junction to reach Kasauli.

Several hotels, homestays besides bed and breakfast units are located beyond Tickethatti. Several politicians and bureaucrats from Delhi, Punjab and Haryana too have constructed houses in the area.

The link road would also ease the traffic movement in the peak tourist season when a large number of vehicles lead to traffic jams at the Garkhal junction enroute Kasauli.

Five roads leading to Kasauli, Tickethatti, Dharampur, Sanawar and Kasauli Gaon converge at the junction.

Villagers had been raising the demand for the link road for several years and a resolution, too, had been passed by the affected panchayats for carving out the link road.

PWD Engineer Vishal Bhardwaj said the permission to axe 13 trees has been secured from the Forest Department and the Forest Corporation will do the needful soon. A 750-metre long and 5-7 metre wide road would be laid to provide link from Shiller and Pathia villages to Tickethatti at a cost of around Rs 40 lakh.

Initially, a kutcha road would be laid for four-wheelers. A path of few feet already exists and it would be widened to create a wider road.

Another proposal to construct a flyover bypassing the Garkhal junction was stuck for months for the want of administrative approvals.

The tardy pace of its clearance would force the commuters to bear with the traffic jams at the junction once again this tourist season. Its construction was stuck as the successful bid had to be cleared by the board of directors of the executing agency, HP State Road and Other Infrastructure Development Corporation.