The city’s first-of-its-kind tunnel underpass for vehicles was inaugurated at the Kolkata Gate crossing in New Town on Thursday evening.
State urban development minister Firhad Hakim and New Town Kolkata Development Authority (NKDA) chairman Debashis Sen inaugurated the underpass.
Located on the Major Arterial Road, the underpass will allow only light motor vehicles and two-wheelers headed to Salt Lake from the Unitech end of New Town as well as those headed towards the Tata Memorial Centre end of New Town, to skip the signal at the crossing. All heavy vehicles like buses, trucks and pick-ups will travel on the surface road.
The underpass is built at a depth of 4.2m beneath the road surface of the Major Arterial Road. It is around 320m long and has four lanes. It spans 7m in width and has a small median divider.
This underpass is working in tandem with a pedestrian subway complex on its lower tier that was unveiled in 2021.
The four-way pedestrian subway complex is located 8m below the vehicle underpass.