PONDA: The Borim villagers have demanded widening of the village roads and construction of a bypass, as the number of vehicles travelling through their village after crossing Borim Bridge, is seeing many folds increase.
The villagers complain that the increasing number of vehicles has been causing them tremendous hardship.
Further, since past many years, due to diversion of heavy vehicles and interstate buses from Cortalim Bridge to Borim Bridge, the Borim villagers say that they have been facing massive traffic congestion.
Currently, the Borim villagers are not able to cross the other side of road during rush hour; and when accidents occur, there is a massive traffic jam.
Local Panchas Sunil Savkar and Constacio Luis expressed concern over the issue.
Sunil Savkar said that due to diversion of heavy vehicles on the Borim Bridge, the structure is weakened and could it collapse any time.
Sunil Sawkar said that the government should have first improved the roads, constructed a bypass in Borim or widened the existing road between Borim and Ponda and only then it should have diverted traffic from Cortalim Bridge to Borim Bridge.
Sawkar and Luis further expressed fear that due to the ongoing construction work on new Zuvari Bridge at Cortalim, the government is exploring the possibility of diverting Margao- Panjim traffic via Verna-Chicklim route.
If this happens, they say, the motorists would prefer to travel Margao- Panjim through Ponda this route is around 14 kilometre shorter. This in turn would further increase the traffic on Borim Bridge, they said.
