adminInnocent Ruwende Senior Reporter
TWO completed sections of the US$80 million Harare Airport Road expressway will be opened to road users next week while work continues on the remaining parts of the road.Augur Investments chairman Mr Ken Sharpe yesterday said all technical aspects were taken into consideration in order to ensure durability and safety.
“Given that further investments from all stakeholders are being made, this will ensure that the current momentum is maintained with a view to completing the Phase 2 of the road works by April 2014.
“This will take the dualisation of the road with uninterrupted traffic flow in both directions up to Dieppe Road. Thereafter the works will be concentrated on the Mukuvisi Section with the main investment being in the bridge structures,” he said.
He said his company had acquired a new plant and equipment which includes a new asphalt mixing plant imported from India for the project, adding that the equipment would remain in the country.
“The Head of State and Government, President Mugabe, took personal interest in the design process to make sure the design of the road would be substantial to the effect that various visitors coming onto it from around the world would feel welcome. The visitors would, on arrival into the country feel that Zimbabwe has moved into the modern world of road standard and quality.
It is a win-win for Government as the road is handed over to them and financed by us while the land they give us in turn, requires further investment from us. The investment will be in terms of town planning skills, design and service to enable us to develop it. Other investors will then construct buildings onto the land that brings further investment and employment for the country,” he said.
He said so far they had invested US$20 million on the road and in turn Government had given them 130 hectares of land in Harare’s prime suburbs of Gunhill and Borrowdale. Mr Sharpe said the land that they were given was mostly unzoned public open spaces and fields which had not been used or earmarked for development.
The project, which started in 2008, would entail the design and construction of a direct link from Enterprise Road at its junction with Robert Mugabe/Mutare Road in Eastlea on the eastern fringes of the CBD, over the National Railways of Zimbabwe marshalling yard, crossing the Mukuvisi River to join the existing Airport Road at Alamein Road in Braeside and Arcadia, adjacent to Morgan Zintec College.
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