Work on the construction of a new bridge at Viralimalai Road intersection near the Railway Junction in Tiruchi has commenced.

The new multilevel Railway Over Bridge (ROB), to be built at a cost of INR 81.40 crore, will come up in place of the existing narrow bridge that has turned a traffic bottleneck in the city. Both the Highways Department and the railways have commenced work simultaneously at the site.

The project will be executed in two stages. In the first stage, a new three-lane road-over-bridge with five arms will be built at a cost of INR 44.28 crore adjacent to the existing bridge. The bridge will be completed in three years and until then traffic will continue through the existing bridge. In the next stage, the old bridge will be dismantled and a new bridge with two arms built in its place. That will take another two years to complete.

The new trestle and embankment bridge has been designed taking into account the traffic volume at the Aristo Hotel Junction, the Railway Station Junction, and the Madurai highway junctions. The bridge will have seven arms each with two to three lanes leading towards the Chennai Bypass, Aristo Hotel Junction, Dindigul Highway, Central Bus Stand, Railway Junction, Madurai Highway, and a new road to be laid near the MSP camp.

The bridge would run for about 1.8 km and the arm towards Chennai Bypass and Aristo Hotel junction would have three lanes each at the higher and lower levels. Service roads would be provided at the ground-level along all important arms, sources in the Highways Department said. The Highways Department has begun work on laying a 'diversion road' between the Dindigul Highway and the Collector's Office Road so that work on the highway could begin. The road will be ready in another 20 days and traffic diverted through it. Traffic diversions would be enforced around the Aristo Junction at a later stage when work on construction of a high-level rotary is taken up.

Although land acquisition is not expected to pose much of a problem as most of the required lands are held by government agencies, the alienation of about 18,500 square metres of land held by the Tamil Nadu Special Police Battalion would prove crucial for the speedy execution of the project. The land is essential for executing a substantial portion of the project work carried out by both the Highways and Railway right from the beginning stage.