SMC to increase income by renting out service ducts

Surat: Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) has been spending Rs150 crore every year for the past seven years on laying new roads and recarpeting of old ones in the city. Recarpeting is largely necessitated by digging up of roads by different agencies for laying pipelines. SMC has started building service ducts on the sides of major roads to tackle this problem. Thus, Surat soon will become first city in Gujarat to do so. At present, 1km of Godadara main road has service ducts.
The ducts are being constructed at Godadara in Limbayat under Smart City visual improvement scheme. These 2x2 feet ducts are made of M 40 type concrete.
Municipal commissioner M Thennarsan said, "Ducts can be built on all new town planning roads and those being laid in new city areas. We need at least two ducts — one for gas and another for use or supply of other commodity. It would be expensive to build ducts, but they would prove cost effective in the long run as we won't have to recarpet roads again and again."
However, ducts would be difficult to built in areas which are in existence for long. It would not be easy to shift the lines of service providers there, he added. It is estimated that nearly 35 per cent of the area of the city where new TP schemes are being implemented, would have ducts along the roads under the Smart City project.
"The ducts would be rented out to service providers. SMC would be able to generate additional income from this," an SMC officer said.
The concept of service duct is common in many cities across the world. However, this concept can be made applicable in India only for new roads. It would be difficult to make all service providers to switch to service ducts, particularly when they have an old arrangement which is working.
by via Surat News, Latest Surat News Headlines & Live Updates - Times of India