The highly-anticipated Eccles to Diamond bypass road on the East Bank Demerara (EBD) is likely to be opened to the public by July month-end.
This is according to Housing Minister Collin Croal who told INews that additional works are ongoing to develop a bridge at Mocha, EBD.
That bridge, which is being constructed to the tune of $95.3M, is expected to create a better flow of traffic from Diamond to Eccles. According to the Housing Minister, it is intended to eliminate bottlenecks. This cost is separate from the $500M allocated for the bypass road.
Construction of the bridge has commenced and is expected to be completed next month, following which, the alternative road will be officially opened to the public.
The bypass road will run from Sixth Avenue, Diamond to the Winsor Estate Road that leads on to the Eccles Landfill Site Road, connecting through the new Herstelling Housing Scheme and other schemes that are being developed along the EBD corridor.
Meanwhile, works are simultaneously ongoing at the head of Diamond for a second entrance into the housing scheme from the East Bank Public Road.
That new road is located between the Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL) factory and the GuyOil Gas Station, and will run to First Avenue.
The $57.1 million project also entails a tarmac for a market and parking lots at Diamond.
The contract was awarded to Bardon Construction Service, and construction will be done in two phases. Phase I will consist of crusher run and Phase II will consist of the application of asphaltic concrete and possible extension of the tarmac access road to First Avenue.
These projects come on the heels of the India-funded Bypass Road Project which would link the East Bank Demerara corridor to the East Coast of Demerara, creating a new highway in the backlands.
The Indian Government had provided a US$50 million Line of Credit (LOC) for the road link that was initially slated for Ogle, ECD to Diamond. However, the project cost was driven up to over $208 million by the previous APNU/AFC regime and the project was at a standstill for several years.
The Ali-led PPP/C administration has since redesigned the project into three phases to fit the LOC. It will now run from Ogle to Haags Bosch at Eccles in the first phase, then from Eccles to Diamond, and finally from Diamond to Timehri to connect to the Cheddi Jagan International Airport (CJIA).
