Hazara Motorway
HAZARA MOTORWAY WORK PROGRESS
Islamabad—National Highway Authority (NHA) Chairman Shahid Ashraf Tarar Monday visited the under-construction site of Hazara Motorway (E-35).
He visited various parts of the project and reviewed the physical progress on the ground and inspected the quality of construction work. Project Director Fayyaz Ahmed briefed the Chairman about the progress on various sections of the project.
The 59 km long six-lane motorway starts near Burhan on M-1 (Peshawar-Islamabad Motorway) and ends at Hevelian. In order to accelerate the pace of work, the entire project has been divided into three sub-sections.
Section -1 (Burhan-Jarikas) is 20.3 km and being constructed by M/s China Gezhouba Group Company and Ghulam Rasool Company as a joint venture (JV).
Section-2 (Jarikas-Sarai Saleh) is 19.2 km and has been awarded as JV to M/s China Gezhouba Group Company and AM Associated. Section-3 (Sarai Saleh-Havelian) is 20.02 km and is given to M/s Limak & ZKB as JV.
During the briefing it was told that Section -1 was 49% complete whereas progress on the remaining two sections were 35% and 13% respectively.
The NHA Chairman expressed satisfaction on the overall progress and hoped that the same level of speed and quality would be maintained in order to meet the completion deadline. He directed the staff to make no compromise on quality of material and construction work. He said the project formed an important link to the China- Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and its timely completion was essential.
The project anticipates enhanced socio-economic uplift of the entire area through creation of thousands of new employment opportunities. It would also reduce travel time from Islamabad to Havelian to just 30 minutes.
The project was earlier designed as 4-lane Expressway but was later converted to 6-lane Motorway on the directives of the Prime Minister. It will be completed by December 2017 at a cost of Rs. 34.37 billion and is being financed by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).