Recently, activist organisation People’s Voice approached the Supreme Court against arbitrary toll collection on national highways. “Providing a smooth ride is the basic principle behind charging toll tax. But when it takes me longer than earlier to travel on a highway, why should I pay toll?” asks SP Gupta, chairman of People’s Voice. Initially covering only the NH8 Delhi-Gurgaon toll road, the PIL has now expanded to challenge 92 build-operate-transfer (BOT) road projects across India where toll is collected. The PIL names 130 people as concerned parties. The various issues: toll booths within municipal limits, multiple taxation, absence of facilities like restrooms, trauma centres, foot over-bridges and so on, which are supposed to be provided for under the rules. The apex court has admitted the plea, questioning why toll should be paid when roads are in such poor shape. Now there’s talk that the Centre could buy back the Delhi-Gurgaon expressway project from DSC, the present operator, and make the stretch toll free.

Even a couple of years ago, the only infrastructure sector that was doing well was roads — companies were racing to outbid each other for even small stretches of highway, traffic growth projections were in high double-digits and non-infra players were queuing up to enter the sector and get their share of the promised riches (returns of around 20%). Now, that has changed. The path ahead for India’s highway builders is full of potholes — traffic projections have gone awry, cost and time overruns are playing havoc with budgets and rising cost of credit is eroding their margins. Established players are shying away from taking on new road projects and many new entrants are looking to offload some of their existing projects — one estimate suggests that a third of all projects awarded by the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) in the past five years are on the block for either complete or partial sale.

http://business.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?281901

Very good article on the road PPP projects. 

Surprised that why NICE &  Devanhalli Elevated Highway  projects not mentioned.

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When they have to get the money from the people they are very diligent etc. When they spend the money there is no control.  They use the most expensive technology which is unnecessary so that can drive up the project cost, they make the pillars unnecessary tall as in Bangalore Metro.  Because of the secrecy, another misuse of the gov power, we cant even know if there was lower bidder or if there was better technology available.

There is clear misuse of govt power in Secrecy, exemption from RTI.  The benefit 80% of PPI goes to private and 20% to public. The PPI is clearly controlled by private party while the public watches silently.

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The Delhi Airport Metro Express, developed under public-private partnership, today resumed commercial operations,nearly six months after it was shut down on grounds of safety. Reliance Infra, which runs the service, had on Monday announced that the Metro line will begin service from today.

The Commissioner of Metro Rail Safety (CMRS) last week gave clearance certificate to the swanky high-speed line, which took 18 minutes for the 23-km journey from New Delhi Railway Station to the Indira Gandhi International (IGI) Airport. The same journey by road would take upwards of an hour.

However, now the trip will take more time, as the CMRS has given permission to operate the high-speed line only at 50 kmph.

Before the service's suspension, the trains were running at a speed of 105 kmph.

http://www.ndtv.com/article/cities/delhi-airport-metro-express-resumes-service-320504?pfrom=home-cities

This progress after 6 months this line was closed and now speed reduced from 105 kMPH  to just 50 KMPH.

Will  Delhi Govt.  or DMRC  gives details to citizens why such speed reduction and  now why it should be called as High Speed

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@50 Kms/Hr speed, for 23 Km stretch,

-Time taken is - 28 Minutes.

@100 Kms /Hr, for 23 Km stretch,

-Time taken is - 14 Minutes.

It would be interesting to see how the DMRC had envisioned the timings initially? Is the demand such that, they had to run trains every 2-3 minutes like Mumbai?

Given the DMRC Airport link mired in Safety controversies, isn't 30 minute time period good enough for a safe and comfortable trip to airport from New Delhi Railway Station?

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" the speed will be gradually increased after periodic inspection by the Delhi Metro."

read here

So this is more of a temp setup and the speed should be back to normal soon..however that is no justification that other airports will need to have a high speed rail connect especially in India..

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When DMRC and Reliance are involved in Airport Express in Delhi,  6 months line was closed,  now by making correction with inspections by restarting the services and gradually increasing the speed with that  looks like  no one is held responsible for this mess.

Look at the Huge investment in this Airport Express still things are in mess,

Same was  the case with BIAL having poor terminal capacity now going for upgradation & still 5 star hotel ( L&T ) not opened  near to terminal even after 5 years due  sluggish industrial growth, 

Now with BMIC road, so much controversy on the agreement,  high toll collections, huge land acquiring

Failure of  Relinace to deliver the trageted gas out put from KG basin even after inflated cost of operations, 

Even Air fares skyrocketing   ( all Airlines hand in hand /  Cartel ) & King Fisher  airline cancelleing  flights without notice & still getting away that. 

Above r some of the  big budget ticket cases  wher Govt or regulatory authorities r not doing anything  shows citizens will be at receiving end and we will be paying high cost for these things

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