NEW DELHI: Deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Saturday held a meeting with public works department’s engineers and sought their views on how to make the city roads better.
Calling them the “frontline workers” of AAP government’s mission to make Delhi roads world-class and safer, Sisodia said the junior engineers of PWD should have a global vision and take ownership of their work.
“They need to focus on not just infrastructure of roads across Delhi, but also on making them beautiful and safer. They must be out in the field and keep a tab on all the evolving irregularities from time to time,” Sisodia said, adding that the engineers will also have to ensure that the irregularities are removed immediately to avoid any inconvenience to commuters.
The deputy CM, who also holds the portfolio of PWD, said that the government will soon organise a training workshop for junior engineers to enrich their professional capabilities.
Delhi PWD maintains 1,280 kilometre of road network, which largely includes all arterial roads such as Ring Road and Outer Ring Road and Pushta Road among others. The department, in the past couple of months, has taken up repair and recarpeting of several of these stretches to ensure a smooth drive for motorists. Along with basic infrastructure, standard road marking, signages and greenery on either side of the roads are also being taken care of by PWD.
The department is also redesigning and beautifying 16 model stretches of roads to bring them on par with “European standards”. The redesigned roads will have cycle lanes, footpaths for the differently abled, open spaces, green belts, and free of bottlenecks and unpaved spaces to keep the roads dust free and the commute smooth. Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal has kept October deadline to complete the project.
Talking to the engineers, Sisodia said just as the principal of a school takes care of all administrative and infrastructure needs of the institution to make it world-class, the junior engineers should work to develop all roads in their respective jurisdiction of global standards.
“Work of road maintenance is an ongoing process and should continue regularly. Officials will have to ensure that commuters do not face any problem during monsoon or after monsoon anywhere across the capital,” he said.
