States may steer expressways

State governments may get to decide private participation and alignment of expressways.

According to the thinking in the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, states will have a leadership role in determining these crucial factors while deciding on the contours of these expressways.

This is in variance with norms followed till now where the Centre would decide on these parameters while the states’ role was limited to handing over the land to such projects.

The ministry has already drafted a cabinet note on the funding of the proposed 18,637 km greenfield expressway scheme, as well as creation of the expressway authority.

“We are currently brainstorming on the various means to take up construction of expressways.

The cabinet note will lay the broad framework, but since these expressways will be greenfield facilities, the respective state governments will have to play a more active role in terms of  micro-management of expressways’ alignment and coordination with infrastructure developers, both realtors and highway,” said a ministry official. The Centre has already begun consultations with the UP Government as part of this initiative.

Expressways are essentially access-controlled roads having high speed and turn around time, relevant from the freight and logistics movement point of view.

For the development of 18,637 km greenfield expressways in phased manner by 2022, the union government brought out a blueprint last year. In the first phase of the plan by 2012, the government has fixed a target of awarding eleven stretches spanning 3,140 km. Phase I will see individual expressways as long as 580 km.

The government’s proposal essentially means that the states inwhich the eleven stretches fall will have to micro-manage the alignment-related issues. “The states will be allowed to tinker with the alignment depending on their needs. However, this will be done under the guidance of the ministry,” said the official.

In the second phase, scheduled between 2013 and 2017, about 3,690 km will be added with the longest stretch being over 700 km. The third phase, between 2018 and 2022, will add another 6,031 km, though stretch details haven’t been estimated yet.

The draft note on funding and creation of the expressway authority has proposed a start-up fund of Rs 10,000 crore to set it up.

For the funding, it has proposed 20% viability gap funding and clubbing the development of expressways with realty development.