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At the toll plazas in TN, user fees will be reduced!!
Posted on: 19/Nov/2022 9:24:52 AM
The superb piece of news is that in the 9 toll plazas in Tamil Nadu, user fees would be cut by 60% during the next revision starting April 2023. This has been mentioned now by Mr. Nitin Gadkari, Union minister for road transport in a letter to Mr. P. Wilson, MP, Rajya Sabha.
These 9 toll plazas are located in Tambaram- tindivanam highway (Paranur, Athur), Chennai Bypass Road ( Vanagaram, Surapattu), Chennai-Tada highway ( Nallur), Chennai- bangalore highway, ( Sriperumbudur, Chennasamudram) and Madurai-Trichy highway( Boothakudi and Chitampati).
The concessionaire has recovered the capital costs incurred on the road project but inspite of this the National Highways Authority of India or NHAI has been increasing the toll plaza rates every year. This was according to Mr. Wilson.
It was mentioned by the Union minister for transport that he has taken the complaint from Mr. Wilson seriously and toll fees would be reduced by 60% for the public funded projects according to section 6(B) National Highway Fee Rules 2008. It was clear from this rule that the toll fee could be reduced only when the project cost has been recovered.
On the NHAI maintained road stretches in TN, there are 55 toll plazas. Out of these 55 toll plazas as manya s 23 are public funded and the rest are constructed under BOT or build-operate- transfer model with a private party. The capital cost has been recovered only at 9 toll plazas now in the state and this was according to NHAI.
According to Mr. Wilson NHAI must engage an independent authority to analyse and audit collections at toll plazas and remove those toll plazas present at a distance of 60km. Advanced technology has been put to use in solving this issue and this was pointed out by the Union minister for transport.
On a pro-rata basis, this technology would enable the authority to charge the commuters and it would be based on the distance travelled. It must be noted that with this new toll management system the distance between the toll plazas would be redundant. It must be recalled that recently a hackathon was conducted by NHAI for getting the best available solution.
