Work on the Delhi-Saharanpur-Dehradun Economic Corridor is underway. Once completed, it will reduce the distance between the two cities from 235 km to 210 km, and travel time from 6.5 hours to just 2.5 hours.
This will be the country’s first highway where there will be a 12 km long elevated corridor for protection of wildlife. The project will be executed under EPC mode. The entire corridor is designed for driving with a minimum 100 km per hour speed.
Wayside amenities every 25-30 km have been provisioned for enhancing the road user experience. Closed toll mechanism will be adopted to enable pay toll only to the extent of highway used.
The development of this corridor is expected to boost economy of the region being served by the highway, especially boosting tourism in the state of Uttarakhand.
For implementation, the entire length from Akshardham (starting point) to Dehradun will be divided into four sections.
Section-1 is being developed to six lanes with six-lane service road being in built-up reach, with complete access control and divided into two packages. Package-I falls in Delhi portion in 14.75 km and out of this 6.4 km is elevated. Package-II falls in Uttar Pradesh in length of 16.85 km and out this 11.2 km is elevated. The tendering process for these two packages has been completed.
This section would start from Akshardham Temple near DME and pass through Geeta colony, Khajurikhas, Mandola, etc. The highway also aims to decongest the North East Delhi and also enhance development potential of Tronica city, Mandola Vihar Yojana of the Uttar Pradesh government.
Section-2 is planned six-lane, fully access-controlled and the entire length is greenfield, passing through districts of Baghpat, Shamli, Muzaffarnagar and Saharanpur. The DPR is complete and tendering process has been initiated in four packages.
The land acquisition process is going on and forest/environment clearance proposal has been applied for. The target for project award is March 2021, subject to obtaining environment clearance and substantial land acquisition is in place.
Section-3 begins from Saharanpur bypass and ends at Ganeshpur. The entire length has been recently completed to four-lane by NHAI. Necessary underpasses and service roads are being planned to make it fully access-controlled to achieve minimum 100 km per hour speed.
Section-4 is a planned six lane with complete access-controlled. This section primarily passes through reserve forest in the state of Uttar Pradesh & Uttarakhand. Out of 20 km, five km is brownfield expansion, and 15 km is realignment comprising elevated wild life corridor (12 km) and approaches to the tunnel (structure 340 mtr).
ROW is restricted to 25 mtr in general due to wildlife concerns. Forest and wildlife clearances have been obtained. The bids in three packages have been received and under evaluation. The target to award the project is by March 2021.
