Mangaluru: Surathkal under Mangaluru City Corporation has been seeing development equal to Mangaluru City.
Though progress is a good thing, traffic on NH – 66 from Surathkal to Mangaluru has been steadily increasing. Large trucks, particularly gas tankers and heavy vehicles weighing 50 to 100 tonnes, plying towards industrial organisations such as MRPL, BASF, OMPL, and MSEZ, among others, are the reason for this.
The accidents and deaths caused by the high density of heavy vehicles have wreaked havoc on people’s lives. In addition, the inner roads and NH – 66 in the Surathkal area add to the problem by being filled with potholes. This necessitates the construction of a Mangaluru bypass route from Surathkal.
The Nagarika Samithi Mangalore Taluk under its aegis has proposed an outer bypass for all tankers and heavy trucks, starting from NIT – K on NH -66, passing through Madya, Baala, Bajpe, Gurupura-Kaikamba, Kulshekara-Padil junction, and joining at NH – 75 moving towards Bengaluru, through which all industrial vehicles heading to Udupi, Mumbai, Bengaluru, and Kerala will ply. With this, not only will traffic congestion on the Surathkal-Mangaluru NH – 66 be reduced but other issues like as road deterioration, accidents, and deaths would be prevented to a great extent.
The Samithi with the slogan “Save Mangalore City from industrial vehicles,” has submitted a memorandum on behalf of citizens of Surathkal area to various stake holders in this regard, informed Samithi President Subhashchandra Shetty.
“As it is for the betterment of Mangaluru City residents this proposal by the Nagarika needs to be processed. The Mayor will be given the aforementioned request to pass at the Corporator Council Meeting. Then to the MLA, who will pursue the case at the state level. All preliminary negotiations took place with both the MLA and the Mayor,” he added.
