Kolkata: With the rain receding in the last few days, the Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation has started pre-puja patchwork of damaged roads in Salt Lake and Rajarhat-Gopalpur.
Patchwork was done on the stretch from J K Saha Bridge to Karunamoyee in the early hours of Tuesday as the civic authorities wanted to cash in on the dry days to complete the work on as many stretches as possible as there is a prediction of rain during puja.
The Bidhannagar traffic police had earlier handed over a list of most damaged stretches to the civic authorities urging them to repair the roads at the earliest, as craters and potholes are dotting many stretches on the avenue and cross roads and also at the crossing at Salt Lake entering from EM Bypass. Loose stone chips could be seen lining the road stretches in many places, making it dangerous, specially for bikers.
“As of now only patchwork will be done to cover as many stretches as possible. Full-fledged bituminous concrete work is planned to be taken up with funds being approved by the state after puja. All 41 wards of BMC spreading over Salt Lake and Rajarhat-Gopalpur will be covered,” said a BMC roads department official.
Earlier, BMC had carried out patchwork and repair work on some stretches of the township last year and towards the beginning of this year, including both the main arterial stretches and the lanes inside the blocks in Salt Lake but craters have resurfaced in most of the places.
A section of residents have been insisting that instead of laying bituminous layer repeatedly as part of patch work which was getting damaged within a short span of time, the civic authorities should consider the option to lay mastic asphalt which is a bit costly but comparatively long lasting and can also save the recurrent road repair costs in the long run.
“The damaged road surface makes it accident-prone. The civic body should consider doing mastic asphalt that lasts long,” said Sourav Mukherjee, a resident of DL block.