NAGPUR: Travellers from Nagpur will be able to reach Pune in 8 hour, via a new proposed expressway connecting Pune to the 701km Hinduhriday Samrat Balasaheb Thackeray Samruddhi Mahamarg.
TOI was the first to report this development on October 27. On Sunday, road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari announced the proposed new alignment of a 268km expressway between Pune-Ahmednagar-Aurangabad to further improve connectivity to Nagpur.
Due to the lack of an elevated expressway and bad roads in patches, and many villages, it takes 16 hours to reach Pune.
The highway will start from the Pune-Bengaluru highway intersection with Pune’s proposed ring road, and will connect to the Samruddhi Expressway at Aurangabad.
The travel time for commuters undertaking their journey from Nagpur to Pune will be cut down to eight hours, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari said. Keeping in mind the inconvenience that commuters have to undergo while undertaking their journey from Nagpur to Pune at present, the Nagpur-Mumbai Samridhi Mahamarg will be connected to the newly proposed Pune-Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar (Aurangabad) Access Control Green Expressway near Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar.