The Federal Government has restated its commitment to the completion of the trailer park in Apapa and the Apapa-Oshodi-Oworonsoki-Ojota expressway project in Lagos.
According to Ministry of Power, Works, and Housing, the contractor is on site and has begun work. The preliminary work, it said, included site preparation, survey work, design work, geothestic investigation, and the site office is also part of it.
Its Director of Highways, South West, Funsho Adebiyi, during inspection of some roads projects in Lagos, said reinforced concrete pavement was going to be used in place of the former flexible pavement to ensure durability of the construction.
While inspecting the trailer park in Apapa, Adebiyi said it had been completed to some extent but could not be put to use for safety and security reasons, saying the toilets, restaurant and police station as well as lighting facilities had been completed.
“The material for the shoreline protection is being imported and to fast track the completion, we told the contractor to move in some of those materials by air,’’ he said.
In his reaction to the Apapa-Oshodi-Oworonsoki-Ojota Expressway project, Federal Controller of Works in Lagos, Adedamola Kuti, said a stakeholders meeting was held with service providers. This was to ensure speedy relocation of communication and electrical cables, water lines and other services in the Right of Way of the project.
The Federal Government awarded the Apapa-Oshodi-Oworonsoki-Ojota Expressway project to AG Dangote Construction Limited at the cost of N73 billion in November 2018, under a tax credit scheme. It has a completion period of two years.
In a similar development, after closure of over one year, the Federal Ministry of Power, Works and Housing, last week, reopened the Apapa/Leventis Bridge to traffic, after it was closed for emergency repairs in August 2016 after a portion of the bridge deck damaged by fire caved in. The 40-year-old bridge links Nigeria’s premier port of Apapa to both the Lagos Mainland and Island.
While performing the tape cutting ceremony to open the bridge, Adebiyi said that the opening would ease gridlock on the Apapa axis. “It is my pleasure to open this bridge in the name of God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Today we are having a new bridge as well as a new access road. So, hopefully gridlock will end here,” he said.
Kuti added that government would soon take drastic action against all forms of abuses that could cause damage to bridges in Lagos. He expressed satisfaction that the reopened section of the Leventis bridge will go a long way in helping the Apapa gridlock situation, pending the time that permanent solution would be put in place.
He thanked residents and commuters for their patience during the period of closure of the bridge and pledged Federal Government’s commitment to continued maintenance of all the roads and bridges in Lagos.
He listed bridges that had been repaired to include the Marine Beach Bridge, Coconut Bridge and Ijora 7Up Bridge.
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