FG To Construct Two Highways to Link Lagos to Abuja and Port Harcourt
Federal Government plans to construct two super highways to link Lagos to Abuja and Port Harcourt.
The Lagos-Abuja and Port Harcourt-Lagos highway projects are to be executed under the public private partnership programme.
Works Minister, Senator Dave Umahi, made this known to the State House correspondents after a meeting with President Bola Tinubu at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
He explains that the proposed highways would be designed for high speed, with more than one lane for each direction of traffic.
He also said that a security strip dividing the two direction would be accommodated in the road design.
The minister said that federal government had already received the commitment from stakeholders to actualize the project within a reasonable period of time.
Umahi also disclosed that the president was briefed on the need to seek better appropriations for the funding of road projects to avoid unnecessary variations in cost and specifications.
He said that the National Assembly would be carried along to see the necessity of providing enough fund to road project that are beneficial to the people.
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He also said that due to inappropriate funding, he has asked the president to direct the termination of road projects that have taken more than 10 years without completion.
The minister assured Nigerians that no project initiated by the past administration would be abandoned by government.
He said that the Tinubu administration inherited 2,604 projects worth N14 trillion covering 18,000 kilometres of roads, adding that a commitment was got for payment of four trillion out of this amount.
The minister added that the government was also committed to the use of reinforced concrete for road pavements across the country.
He said concrete is capable of withstanding heavy loads, such as heavy vehicles, with less deformation and serving for years without major repairs.
Several factors affect concrete pavement performance, such as traffic, soil, environmental, economic and stress distribution factors.
He said that the merit of these would be the use of local materials and elimination of imported items, which has been the cause of contract variations in the country.
On the structural defects on the Third Mainland bridge, Umahi said that work has started and articulated vehicles had been stopped from plying it for now.
