ISLAMABAD: City managers are mulling to slightly realign Margalla Road near Shah Allah Ditta to preserve a century old graveyard.

CDA’s engineering wing is planning to shift the road to southern side of the graveyard towards sector D-13.

The construction work of Phase I of Margalla Road (from GT road to D-12) is near completion as 70pc work has already been completed.

Officials of engineering wing said that project could be completed in next three months.

CDA was in a fix about dealing with the graveyard that falls in the alignment of the under-construction road.

They said that the CDA was focusing on two options either construct a flyover or a tunnel to save the graveyard.

However, now, a third option is being seriously considered for slightly shifting a portion of around 100ft road towards sector D-13.

“We are working on third option of realignment of road and in next few days, the CDA’s management will take a final decision in this regard,” an engineer said.

The portion of the road starts from G.T. Road and ends in D-12 from where after construction of an interchange and a small portion of 11th Avenue it will be linked with Khayaban-i-Iqbal.

The 33-km long Margalla Road from G.T. Road to Bhara Kahu is part of Islamabad’s master plan.

However, the CDA decided to construct it in three phases.

According to CDA, two phases will be constructed this year and third one will be in future, when need arises.

Under the first phase (from G.T. Road to D-12), work is in progress and some officials believe that work will be completed in August-September this year.

In the second phase, an eight-km-long Bhara Kahu bypass will be constructed from Murree Road near Quaid-i-Azam University to Satra Meel.

However, there is no serious development in second phase (Bhara Kahu bypass) as CDA is yet to approve its PC-I.

CDA officials said after completion of first phase, the CDA will move towards bypass.

They said that alignment and engineering survey of bypass has already been done and whenever CDA’s Development Working Party approves its PC-I, the project will be handed over to contractor.

Margalla Road’s project is being executed by

Frontier Works Organisation (FWO), which was engaged by CDA last year under 42(f) of Public Procurement Regulatory Authority (PPRA), which allows government owned organisations to contract with other state owned organisations.

“We are committed to completing both phases of this road, after completing first phase we will focus on bypass,” said an engineer of CDA, adding that bypass is also important to provide big relief to traffic moving towards Murree, Kashmir and Glayat area, as during summer, people faced regular traffic congestion in Bhara Kahu area.

The engineer said that first phase of the project was also equally important as it would provide an alternative road to traffic coming from G.T. Road and Airport side.

Published in Dawn, May 29th, 2022