Vehicles going from New Town to Salt Lake and EM Bypass are expected to slow down because of a traffic diversion that is likely to be in place from next week.
The diversion has been planned to facilitate the construction of the Nabadiganta Metro station of the upcoming New Garia-Airport corridor.
The diversion, likely to remain for “at least a month”, will be in place near the Box Bridge that connects Sector V and Salt Lake to New Town.
“We got permission from Bidhannagar police commissionerrate on Monday. This is going to be the first stage of the diversion,” said Kausik Mitra, the Metro spokesperson.
Based on inputs from the police and railway officials, here’s a lowdown on the curbs:
A 500m stretch of the Bypass and Salt Lake-bound flank of the Salt Lake Bypass in front of the Technopolis Building will be shut to facilitate the construction of the metro station.
Vehicles from New Town headed towards the Bypass, will have to take a left turn towards Ring Road in Sector V, in front of Godrej Waterside.
The vehicles must travel to the Nicco Park crossing where they will be able to get onto the Salt Lake Bypass and then onto the Bypass through the Chingrighata crossing.
Salt Lake-bound vehicles will have to take the same left turn from the traffic signal at the base of the Box Bridge.
They will have to take a sharp right turn at the next intersection barely 30m onto Street Number 1 in Sector V, near the Kia car showroom, and drive behind the Technopolis building before getting onto the Salt Lake Bypass.
The diversion is likely to be enforced from Monday. The cops have already conducted a trial run on Wednesday.
The diversion is slated to cause delays as this route is the main entry and exit point of New Town.
Even now, during non-peak hours, it takes more than 15 minutes to travel from the traffic signal at the New Town bus stop to the Technopolis Building, which is around 2km away. During office hours, the travel time stretches to around 30 minutes.
The diversion is likely to be set up from Sunday or Monday, sources in the police and RVNL, the agency building the New Garia-Airport Metro corridor.
While a senior RVNL official declined to comment on the tentative duration of the curbs, police sources said they were likely to last “at least a month”.
The New Town-bound flank will be shut in the second phase of the curbs.
This Nabadiganta station near Technopolis will be the 13th station towards the airport.
The construction was stalled by land-related problems, said Metro officials.
“As a result, this station has to be shifted to a new location to avoid the disputed land. For this 2,791 square metres of fresh land was acquired from the Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority,” said an official.