Costing AED 830 million
Dubai (UAE): In line with the directives of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the UAE Vice-President and Prime Minister, Ruler of Dubai, the Roads and Transport Authority's (RTA) Board of the Directors headed by H.E Mattar Al Tayer, Chairman of the Board and Executive Director of RTA, awarded the project to develop Al Ittihad road for a total cost of AED 830 million.
The work will commence immediately and will be completed in two years, as part of the RTA efforts to achieve a comprehensive solution to the traffic congestion on the road linking Dubai with Sharjah.
Among several tenders have received from different companies, the project has been awarded in two separate contracts, to the best offers, as the first contract was awarded to Belhasa road constructing company with a total value of AED 478.566 million, while the second contract was awarded to the National Wheel J&P Company in a total value of 349.666 million.
H.E Mattar Al Tayer said that this project is part of the RTA strategy to cope with the requirements of development and to meet the needs of increasing of population. It's part of a number of vital projects that are being implemented to develop and improve roads and the provision of advanced services in residential areas.
He said that the expansion of Al Ittihad road comes within the comprehensive plan of the RTA which has been recently approved by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, for developing and improving the roads network in the Emirate to cope with the growth and development and to meet the current and future needs of roads and transportation.
Pointing to the efforts of the RTA in conducting extensive researches and studies on the best practices to update the roads network in Dubai in order to develop and facilitate the movement of vehicles which increase by 25% every year to be about three vehicles for every 10 members, which the highest of its kind in the world.
He said that the project is part of a complete system to solve the traffic congestion in Dubai and that beside other procedures including new legislation and regulations on the licensing of vehicles and drivers, and to improve the public and maritime transportations, operating Dubai Metro, the tolling system on tariff, and the implementation of the smart traffic systems.
In the same context, Eng Maitha Bin Adai, CEO of the Traffic and Roads Agency, said that the first contract of project includes the part of Al Ittihad road between the intersection of Al Nahdah to Al Sho'lah intersection and contains works including coverage of the tunnel Al Nahdah junction and to change the roundabout to a junction controlled by traffic lights, and to build a three new tracks tunnel along the existing tunnel and to expand Al Ittihad road between the junction and up to Al Qeyadah tunnel (Dubai Police Headquarter) by separating the movement of the high sizes traffic from the junction through the establishment of two separated tunnels on Al Ittihad road, each of them consists two lanes in each direction along side the existing tunnel to provide four tunnels in each direction.
The project also includes the building of a bridge of two lanes to ease the movement from Al Quds road to Al Ittihad road and to build a bridge of two lanes from Salah al Din Street to merge with another bridge in the same direction from Abu Hail Street, the three lanes will serve Al Ittihad road in the direction to Sharjah. The project also includes the developing of the public library junction at Hor Anz.
She added that the second contract include works located between the junction of Al Sho'la up to Al Garhoud Junction with Al Rabat road and contains a number of works including explanation of Al Ittihad road between Al Sho'la junction up to the junction of Al Garhoud road with Al-Rabat road, and to develop the junction of the airport (the Bowling) in separating the movement with high sizes traffic by building two lanes bridge to serve the movement of left lane from Al Garhoud road to the airport road towards Dnata and to build another two lanes bridge to serve the movement from Al Ittihad road to the left towards the airport, in addition to the construction of a new four lanes tunnel in each direction beside the already existing tunnel each direction.
Accordingly, Nabil Mohammad Saleh, Director of the Roads Department said that the works of the project will begin immediately according to the framework of the RTA to improve and upgrade the main roads in Dubai and this project comes within a comprehensive plan to reduce the congestion at Al Ittihad road by 58% through the explanation works expanding along the 5,7 km starting from a bridge the new Al Garhoud Bridge up to Al Nahda passing through the junction of the airport (bowling) and the Dubai police Headquarter.
He added that the traffic movement on Al Ittihad road at the present ranging between 200 thousand to 250 thousand vehicles per day in both directions, and this project is complementary to the road projects being implemented by the RTA to solve the problem of traffic bottlenecks to ensure smooth flow of traffic in Dubai.
-Ends-
© Press Release 2006
