WD News: Travellers headed to Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport and residents of Dwarka sub-city are set to get some relief from issues related to flooding and waterlogging during monsoon as the Delhi Development Authority (DDA) will redevelop the entire drain and create five new water bodies to store excess rainwater.
According to officials, Mr Vinai Kumar Saxena, Lieutenant Governor inspected the project recently and directed the executive agency to complete the project by May 2023. All concerned departments have been strictly directed to start works for de-silting and redevelopment of drain lines to avoid waterlogging when foreign dignitaries arrive for the next G20 summit.
Speaking about the initiative, an official with the L-G’s House said, “Once completed, these water bodies will have a total storage capacity of 1.22 lakh cubic metres (cu m) and it will prevent rainwater from flooding the streets.”
Of the five proposed water bodies, three will be in Dwarka Sector 8 and the remaining two will come up in Dwarka Sector 20 and Dwarka Sector 23. An existing water body at a DDA plot in Sector 8 will be enhanced to a capacity of 13,700 cu m, while two new water bodies, with a combined holding capacity of 25,700 cu m, will be created on another DDA plot in Sector 8, they added. The proposed water body at Dwarka Sector 20 will have a storage capacity of 20,250 cu m, while the one at Dwarka Sector 23 will be the largest, with a holding capacity of 62,800 cu m.
“Heavy waterlogging sometimes leads to cancellation of flights for several days. Due to this, the airport has been forced to shut occasionally,” the officials added.
The airport drain will be capable of discharging 70 cu m of water per second during heavy rain. The drain will start from inside the IGI Airport premises, pass beneath the railway tracks adjoining the airport boundary in Dwarka Sector 8 and will connect to DDA’s Trunk Drain-2 (TD-2) that will further channelise the rainwater to the Najafgarh Drain, officials explained.
While the construction of the drain within the airport premises will be done by Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL), the Northern Railway is constructing a culvert over the railway land and the remaining construction work will be carried out by the DDA. The airport drain will be 20 metres wide and will have a depth of 2 metres, said officials.
Source: The Indian Express
Image courtesy: Pixabay
