DA opens flyover loop, residents left in the lurch

DA opens flyover loop, residents left in the lurch

Staff Reporter



SIGNAL-FREE RIDE: Airport Road flyover loop, which connects Airport Road with Indiranagar, before being thrown open to traffic on Thursday. — Photo: Sampath Kumar G.P.

BANGALORE: The Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) opened the final loop connecting Airport Road in Domlur to Indiranagar on Thursday. With this, the longest pending project of the BDA — the Rs. 36-crore Airport Road grade separator — has been completed.

The project, comprising one main flyover and four loops, has been involved in litigation. The project was delayed by over two years because of problems between the BDA and the contractor, Uttar Pradesh State Bridges Corporation. However even as BDA inaugurated the loop, which provides a signal free ride to motorists, residents of nearby apartments complained about lack of access to the main road because of the flyover. Nateshan Murthy, resident of ISRO apartments, complained to BDA Commissioner M.K. Shankarlinge Gowda that they had to travel nearly 2 km, right up to Koramangala, to take a U-turn to get to Indiranagar and the Airport.

He alleged that BDA had allowed crossings on the Indiranagar side because many officials lived there.

The BDA Commissioner told presspersons that there was no question of introducing options for U-turns anywhere near the flyover. He said that crossings on the Indiranagar side of the flyover would be closed on Friday.