Parkop: K100 million road works to ease congestion

Source: The National, Thursday, February 21, 2013 

 

By MALUM NALU

TRAFFIC bottlenecks along the 8-Mile and 9-Mile areas in Port Moresby, where a major building boom is taking place, will soon be a thing of the past with K100 million worth of road works to start this year, says National Capital District Governor Powes Parkop.
He told The National that a flyover would be built from Kookaburra Street at Erima to Jackson Airport, and that the back road from Erima to Waigani and onward to Gerehu would soon be available to traffic.
“We are in the process of planning a flyover from Kookaburra Street across to the airport,” Parkop said.
“Once that happens, it will relieve all the traffic congestion there.
“It will be a four-lane road with a flyover, so it will ease the traffic.
“Our engineers have come up with some plans on how to reduce the congestion there.
“The work will start soon, especially widening the lane going up to 8-Mile with a clear two-lane road, and shutting down the traffic coming from the airport going into Kookaburra Street.
“Once we do that, it will ease the traffic there, but the long-term solution is to have a flyover, and a proposal for an underpass – something that our engineers are working on.”
Regarding the Erima-Waigani back road, Parkop said: “We will link Sir John Guise Drive to Kookaburra Street, and on to the airport.
“We’re also going to start planning to link the back that goes to parliament to Morata, and on to the university and Gerehu Stage 1.
“That will cater for the (Pacific) Games Village when it is built at the university.
“When Pacific Games comes in 2015, the athletes will be based at the Games Village and they can easily come out that way and on to Sir John Guise Stadium, Bisini, and other sporting facilities in the city.”
Parkop said Port Moresby required about K900 million worth of infrastructure development and overseas funding would be sought for this.