Tag: jewar
GREATER NOIDA: Following the appointment of RITES, a Government of India Enterprise for conducting an Obstacle Limitation Survey (OLS) for the proposed international airport at Jewar, Uttar Pradesh Director, Civil Aviation Devendra Swaroop met Arunvir Singh, Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority(YEIDA) on Tuesday to take the project further. A team of officials from RITES also met Singh to chart out the road map for conducting an Obstacle Limitation Survey (OLS) for the project.
According to YEIDA officials, the survey by RITES for the OLS will commence from next week. “A team of YEIDA officials will provide complete support to the RITES officers for the survey,” said Singh. “The OLS survey is likely to be completed by June 15, 2017,” he explained.
The Union ministry of civil aviation in May 2016 had asked the UP government to conduct a fresh feasibility study and OLS survey on the project as a similar assessment was conducted by UP civil aviation department director for the airport project in 2010. On April 26, 2017, YEIDA had formally appointed RITES for the survey.
Singh further told TOI that Chairman YIEDA, Dr Prabhat Kumar will also discuss the phased-wise construction plan for the airport on Friday, May 12, 2017. “The phasing for the construction of the proposed airport was discussed with the Civil Aviation Director on Tuesday. The central government has recommended some changes in the earlier construction plan. However, the final decision and phase plan will be revealed by the Chairperson,” he said.
The Jewar airport proposal has been hanging fire for years, first mooted in 2001 by Rajnath Singh, the CM of UP then. Mayawati, too, pushed for it when she succeeded him as CM. But in 2012 the Akhilesh Yadav government scrapped the project, citing the clause that bars development of a second airport close to an existing one. Yadav instead pitched for Saifai as one of the three new options where an airport could come up. However, in November 2015, the UP government sent a letter expressing willingness to revive the Jewar airport proposal. The Civil Aviation Ministry worked on it and finally gave approval to the UP government in March this year.
The project has been fully revived after BJP came to power in UP and Yogi Adityanath the state chief minister decided to propel the project back on track.
GREATER NOIDA: With the reins of the UP government in new hands, Yamuna ExpresswayIndustrial Development Authority (YEIDA) has decided to revive the high-speed Metro link project between Greater Noida and the proposed international airport at Jewar. In a meeting held last week, officials of YEIDA discussed the issue with Delhi Metro Rail Corporation and the latter is likely to revert to YEIDA within a week on whether the project and cost would be feasible.
The corridor was first proposed by YEIDA board in February 2014 and again in June 2015. In June 2016, the DMRC had told YEIDA that it was too early to prepare a techno-economic feasibility report (TEFR) for the proposed corridor and suggested that it be done after five years.
According to YEIDA officials, they decided to revive the project in order to provide connectivity to the rapidly urbanizing area.
The proposed 35-km Metro track will be aligned at the road level along the Yamuna Expressway. It will link the zero point of the Yamuna Expressway in Greater Noida to YEIDA’s proposed Jewar airport.
This track will also be linked to the under-construction 29.7km Metro corridor connecting Noida and Greater Noida. “We have asked DMRC to study the primary feasibility of the project along with the cost,” said Arunvir Singh, chief executive officer, YEIDA.
“DMRC will conduct an initial feasibility study and will let us know, after which we will take the project further and ask them to prepare a TEFR for the proposed project,” he said.
The proposed line is expected to not only provide a fast link between the two townships of Greater Noida and YEIDA, but also bring these places closer to the national capital by boosting connectivity.
According to officials, the cost for putting in place an elevated Metro track is estimated at nearly Rs 200 crore/km. By the same formula, the YEIDA
Metro should cost more than Rs 7,000 crore.
However, YEIDA has asked DMRC to study the feasibility and financial viability of running the Metro at the road level along the expressway.
This will bring down the cost to almost Rs 40-50 crore/kilometre.
“The population in Greater Noida and YEIDA is set to increase considerably. Besides, several new housing schemes are also in the pipeline. Considering that thousands of more people will come to reside in the area, the Metro link will prove to be very useful. It will also serve the several proposed residential, industrial and IT units along the expressway besides the proposed Jewar international airport.”
On February 2, 2014, the YEIDA board proposed the Metro track to run along the Yamuna expressway between Pari Chowk in Greater Noida and Sector 22 in the YEIDA area.
On June 24, 2015, the then CEO of YEIDA Santosh Yadav decided to take the Metro track further up to Jewar. This track was proposed to be 38km long between Knowledge Park II in Greater Noida and Jewar area.
However, in October 2015, YEIDA once again changed the route of the proposed Metro alignment.
The new proposal linked a 20-km Metro corridor between the zero-point of the Yamuna Expressway in Greater Noida to YEIDA’s Sector 20.
Good news for investors;
The land required for Jewar Airport on Yamuna Expressway near Noida can be acquired in six months after the Centre clears the project, CEO of Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (YEIDA) Arun Vir Singh said.
He said after the acquisition, the authority will be able to build the airport in three years. YEIDA, he said, has written to the civil aviation ministry seeking permission for the project.
In 2001, Rajnath Singh, then UP chief minister, first proposed an airport at Jewar. Mayawati, too, pursued the project after she became chief minister in 2007, but failed to make any headway because there was a distance clause which prevented setting up a new airport within 150km of IGIA. Jewar is about 100km from IGIA.
Arun Vir Singh said this clause has been dropped in the new aviation policy, making an airport at Jewar possible.
In fact, two airports at Amarawati and Vijayawada are now being developed just 80km of each other.
But what really tilted the scales in favour of Jewar airport is chief minister Yogi Aditya Nath’s push. Within days of taking over, he asked his officials to go ahead and draw up plans and take the Centre’s permission.
The Centre is likely to go along with the proposal as Gautam Budh Nagar MP Mahesh Sharma, who is the Union culture and tourism minister, had said a number of times that he favoured a new airport to come up at Jewar.
But the Akhilesh Yadav-led SP government had been dragging its feet. His government tried to find out some alternate site for the purpose. But that did not work out.
YEIDA boss Singh said around 5,000 hectare (12,500 acre) area has been notified for the airport. But the immediate requirement of land will be around 1,200 hectare (3,000 acre).
GMR, which operates the IGI airport, will get the first right of refusal to build the Jewar airport because of the terms accepted by the government while giving it the contract to modernise and expand IGIA. The airport will provide a huge impetus to development in Noida, Greater Noida, Ghaziabad, Meerut, East Delhi and areas on the Yamuna Expressway till Aligarh, Mathura and Agra. Because of the Yamuna Expressway, the driving time to Mathura and Aligarh is about 75 minutes. CREDAI chairman and CMD of ATS Infrastructure Getamber Anand said the new airport will create huge job opportunity in the region and will drive all round development.