K4m for East New Britain road upgrades

 DAWAPIA road, a vital industrial road that was impassable for the past several years in Rabaul, East New Britain, will be upgraded.

This follows the approval of remaining funds left from the Rabaul town roads and drainages rehabilitation K4 million grant to go towards emergency works on the road.

The Rabaul joint district planning and budget priority committee recently approved the remaining balances of about K450,000 under the K4 million grant to be transferred and placed under the Dawapia Road and drainage reconstruction bringing the total funds remaining to K760,640.

According to a policy paper, the initial budget for Dawapia road was K1.2 million but K500,000 was transferred to the Toleap-Kurakakaul road rehabilitation project and K100,000 was allocated for the purchase of vehicles for three local level government presidents.

The road has been closed due to the impassable state and traffic hazard it posed to the travelling public. 

It was the only road that was designed and constructed to accommodate for the heavy vehicles accessing the industrial areas along the Rabaul port.

Preliminary scoping done by the works department towards the end of 2011 to early 2012 estimated the complete rehabilitation of the road to cost K2.9 million.

However, another preliminary scope recently done by the Gazelle Restoration Authority (GRA) engineers estimated the total rehabilitation works to cost almost K3.4 million. GRA was given the responsibility to manage and supervise the emergency works on the road.

This means that the road will be fixed and Malaguna Technical Secondary School teachers’ houses and the United church regional office at Malaguna alongside the road will be saved.

The current condition of the road has also disrupted public utilities such as electricity and water supply to areas within the vicinity due to the fallen power poles and broken water pipes.

GRA will carry out emergency works to prevent further damage and destruction of the road awaiting further financial assistance for the complete rehabilitation of the road.