Bus Rapid Transit ground-breaking on Aug 14

PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government is finalising arrangements to inaugurate work on the much-talked-about Peshawar Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project on August 14 in an effort to coincide the event with the 70th Independence Day.

Chief Minister Pervez Khattak has instructed the quarters concerned to complete all the formalities at the earliest so that the groundbreaking of the project could be held on schedule.

The first phase of the bidding process that started on June 19 has been completed with the evaluation and acceptance of the technical bids of 12 firms for the three portions of the project.

The technical proposals have been sent for approval to the Asian Development Bank (ADB), which is the main funding agency of the project.

The ADB is providing about Rs50 billion for the project, including Rs30 billion infrastructure expenditure and Rs20 billion for the procurement of buses and other miscellaneous costs.

The executive committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) has already approved Rs49.34 billion for the project.

The provincial government will also spend Rs10 billion on the project.

The 26-kilometre long BRT project has been divided into three stages.

 The stage-I starts from Chamkani to Firdous Chowk. The stage-II will start from Firdous Chowk and reach Amn Chowk after passing through the congested localities of Khyber Bazaar, Soekarno Square, Shoba Bazaar, Sunehri Masque Road and Peshawar Garrison Club.

The third and final stage will begin from the Amn Chowk and end at Hayatabad.

Peshawar Development Authority (PDA) Director Aminuddin said that initially 33 firms received bidding documents for the three stages of the project. He added that 21 firms received documents for the first and second stages while 12 got the documents for the final stage.

He added that the technical bids of 12 firms have been opened and sent to the ADB after evaluation.

The BRT would be the biggest urban transit project in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. From Chamkani to Hayatabad, it would pass through 31 stations including 23 to be built on ground and eight being overhead stations.

The BRT stations would be set up at Chamkani Chowk, Chugulpura, Dr Zareef Memorial School, Sethi Town, Sikandar Town, Gulbahar School, Noor Market Hashtnagri, Gul Market Firdous, Hospital Road, Soekarno Square, Dabgari Garden, Cantt Railway Station, Sunehri Masjid Road, Mall Road, Khyber Road, Gora Qabristan, Tehkal, Tambwan, Abdara Road, University Road, KTH/University of Peshawar, Islamia College, Board Bazaar, Tajabad, Hayatabad Model School, Hayatabad Phase-III, Tatara Park, PDA and Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital.

The BRT’s elevated portion would start from Malik Saad Flyover and run parallel to the flyover.

Passing through Soekarno Square and Shoba Bazaar, the elevated portion would be diverted to Sher Shah Suri Road through an overhead link.

The elevated portion will then run through Sunehri Masjid Road to reach Khadim Hussain Road.

The officials of the Local Government, Elections and Rural Development Department told The News on Tuesday that the chief minister had asked the department to complete all the formalities, including the conclusion of the bidding process so that the project could be inaugurated on August 14.

They expressed the hope that all official procedures would be completed over the next 10 days and work on the project would positively be launched on the auspicious occasion of the Independence Day.

The officials said they still stick to their commitment to complete the project in its stipulated time of six months.

An elaborate traffic plan has also been worked out to divert the vehicular traffic coming from the peripheries into the city to the alternate routes as only single way would be used during the construction of the BRT corridor.