Mega plan for Industrial Corridor

Kakinada, May 19: The government plans to spent Rs 20,000 crore to develop ‘linkages’ for the industrial corridor between Kakinada and Visakhapatnam. These include roads, railways, airports, ports and other external infrastructure.

The proposal has got the nod of the Centre a few days ago. Under this project, a 138 km-long
coastal corridor will be built between Kakinada Port and Gangavaram Port (near Vizag) with six-lane roads and pipeline corridor at a cost of Rs 1,062 crore. In the subsequent phases the link road will be converted into an eight-lane road by spending Rs 875 crore.

As part of the programme, the present Asian Development Bank-sponsored road will be converted as a four-lane road between Kathipudi and Kakinada Port in an extent of 51.07 km. In addition to this, the National Highway 214 will be developed into four-lane road from the present two-lane at a cost of Rs 260 crore. Later, it will be developed into a six-lane road at a cost of Rs 387 crore. As part of the industrial corridor development, the existing NH 5 will be developed into six-lane road for 190 km between Rajahmundry and Visakhapatnam.

In addition to this, the other external road links will be provided with Rs 512 crore. In all,
Rs 4,021 crore will be spent on the road development activity as part of Industrial corridor project. For the development of rail links Rs 1,010 crore will be spend in the corridor. A rail
link of 26 km will be taken up at a cost of Rs 102 crore between APSEZ and Gangavaram. For the provision of rail freight stations and for Gangavaram Port logistics Rs 730 crore will be utilised.

Further, authorities are allocating Rs 2,640 crore for developing airports in the region. This
would include the development of the new Visakhapatnam International Airport with Rs 2,000 crore and the upgradation of Rajahmundry airport at Rs 120 crore. These proposals were discussed at a meet held recently by the Infrastructure Development Corporation of Andhra Pradesh with allied departments.