PONDA: Expressing concerns over the ongoing hill cutting activity for widening the two-way service road alongside the four-lane National Highway, Kerya-Khandepar residents demanded that proper signboards be installed to ensure the safety of commuters.
A local Rocky Dias said the hill cutting at Kerya is going on for constructing a service road alongside the highway. However, with the ongoing hill cutting activity, there is every possibility that a loose boulder may roll down on the road which could prove dangerous to motorists especially two-wheeler riders.
He claimed that at another location at Kerya, trucks unload the mud at the road construction site. However, despite the movement of trucks, there is no signboard alerting commuters to go slow, which could lead to fatal accidents as these trucks ply along the route at high speed.
Stating that they are not against development works, the locals said they welcomed several works at Khandepar and Kerya including the approach road to the new bridge and service road. However, they demanded that proper signboards be installed while undertaking works to ensure the safety of motorists.
They locals recalled that there was a major landslide five years ago while undertaking road widening work, which brought traffic on the highway to a ‘grinding halt’ for nearly a fortnight.
The locals demanded that the authorities should ensure that such incidents are not repeated in future.
