Delhi to Meerut travel time reduces to 50 minutes, Expressway opens from April 1

Earlier, it used to over 2 hours to cover the distance between Delhi and Meerut.

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New Delhi: In a welcome development for commuters, the travel time between Delhi and Meerut is going to be reduced to just 50 minutes starting from April 1. This will be made possible as the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has announced that the phase 2 and 4 of the Delhi-Meerut expressway will become operational.

Until now, it used to take about 2 hours to cover the distance between the two cities. Before April 1, only phase 1 and 3 of the expressway were functioning.

On this 14-lane expressway, a speed limit of 70 km per hour has been fixed from Delhi's Sarai Kale Khan to UP Gate, while the speed limit from UP Gate to Meerut has been fixed at 100 km per hour.

Slow-moving vehicles like tractors and two-wheelers will be prohibited from using the expressway. Violation of speed limit will attract a penalty.

According to NHAI project manager Mudit Garg, state-of-the-art technology has been used to build the expressway. 

200 high-sensitivity cameras have been installed at regular intervals throughout the stretch which would be powerful enough to capture the number plate from a distance of about half a kilometre.

According to Garg, only one physical toll plaza has been installed on the expressway, which is at Kashi near Meerut.

The toll charge would be calculated on the basis of the distance covered by a vehicle. FASTag would be used for this purpose.

One of the most ambitious projects of NCR, this expressway has been completed in 4 phases. The portion from Delhi's Sarai Kale Khan to UP Gate was completed a year ago which was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. It took about 3 years to complete the entire expressway. About Rs 8340 crores have been spent on this project.

According to the proposal sent to the Transport Ministry, the toll from Delhi to Meerut can be kept from Rs 125 to Rs 150.