The Kolkata Municipal Corporation is mulling over plans to set up plants for preparing a plastic mix to be used for repairing smaller roads.
The civic body recently received a list of vulnerable stretches from the city police. Kolkata Police is said to have sent a list of more than 300 stretches of roads that need
repair.
According to the mayor of KMC, road repair works have been started at several places while many of these are lying battered. As elaborated by the mayor, for around twenty years, road repairs using ‘mastic’ were being carried out but the National Green Tribunal has prohibited the practice.
Following the order, the state Public Works Department took up ‘mechanical mastic,’ a concept adopted from outside the country. According to the mayor, the cost of the mechanical mastic is almost double that of the earlier mastic. “The cost of mechanical mastic is around 1300 per square feet. Also, the process cannot be implemented on roads apart from major ones. This was a challenge to us,” informed the mayor.
Given the situation, the Roads Department of KMC experimented with a method of repairing roads using a plastic mix at Bakshi Bagan in ward number 103. “The idea was successful and it has been observed that the road at this stretch remained undamaged even after two years. Therefore, it has been decided to procure the require- ments for setting up a plant,” informed Mr Hakim.