Now,alternative route to Airport and Gurgaon

The stretch gets traffic from Vasant Kunj and its surrounding areas,besides Outer Ring Road. “Once the work is completed,it will help take some load off Outer Ring Road,especially as far as the Airport-bound traffic is concerned. People currently tend to avoid this road as there is a bottleneck at the Mehrauli-Mahipalpur T-junction,when the road narrows down from Kishangarh towards the T-junction. But once the road is widened,it will help ease traffic movement from Gurgaon and NH-8 towards Munirka and Vasant Vihar,besides traffic from South Delhi to the Airport as well as Gurgaon,’’ a PWD official said.

The cost of the project is Rs 6 crore,and the work is likely to be completed by December. “We have started widening work,and the plan is to lay a road with six lanes for 500 metres,with a divider in the middle. The rest of the 500 metres (in front of Fortis Hospital) will be four-laned as the DDA has not removed encroachments. We can only widen the road once all the encroachments are removed,’’ a PWD official said.

“This road is supposed to have a 45-metre-wide right of way (ROW) according to Masterplan 2021. Besides removal of encroachments,utility services such as transformers and dhalaos will also have to be removed during the course of the work,’’ an official added.

The DDA said that while it had started demolishing houses,shops and showrooms on this stretch in July,many of the affected people went to court and obtained a stay. “We cannot demolish these properties till the stay is vacated,’’ a DDA official said.

This project of widening Aruna Asif Ali Marg was supposed to have been taken up before the Games but,like several other projects,it was delayed as it was not directly related to the Games. “The decision to start work on the stretch despite encroachment problems was taken at the top level,” said an official.