Mega projects miss 2025 deadline

Long-pending infrastructure & healthcare development will continue into 2026

RAWALPINDI:

With only 14 days remaining until the end of 2025, work on some long-pending major projects of Rawalpindi, including the Leh Expressway and the Children's Hospital, could not commence during the current year.

However, three road infrastructure projects of the Punjab government were completed in Rawalpindi during the outgoing year.

Work on the Kachehri Chowk mega project is ongoing and is scheduled for completion by March 2026, along with three additional underpasses.

In the New Year, construction work will begin on one more flyover and one underpass. Road infrastructure projects worth more than Rs30 billion undertaken by the Punjab government are expected to be completed in the coming year.

The year also saw the launch of the electric bus service for the residents of Rawalpindi. Meanwhile, the Rs50 billion Rawalpindi Ring Road project is expected to be completed in the New Year.

According to sources, only two road infrastructure projects related to Rawalpindi's development were completed this year including the Nawaz Sharif Flyover at Khawaja Corporation Chowk on Adiala Road, and underpasses at TM Chowk and GPO Chowk on Mall Road.

Construction work on three underpasses and one flyover at Kachehri Chowk, which began on November 3 this year, is now expected to be completed by March or April next year.

During the New Year, construction of underpasses at Race Course Chowk, Qabristan Chowk, and Charing Cross Chowk on Peshawar Road will also begin, with a completion deadline of three months. In addition, a new flyover will be constructed at Ammar Shaheed Chowk, where an underpass already exists.

Work on the Rawalpindi Ring Road, which has been underway for the past three years, has reached 75 per cent completion. Authorities have announced that the project will be completed by the last week of March next year.

In the New Year, plans have also been approved to start projects, including the expansion of an additional track on a two-kilometre stretch of Murree Road from Liaquat Bagh to Chandni Chowk, and the construction of an underpass at Ninth Avenue Chowk on IJP Road.

However, progress could not move beyond the preparation of a Rs9.5 billion PC-I for the long-pending Lai Expressway and Flood Channel Project, as well as the conversion of the long-incomplete Mother and Child Hospital into a Children's Hospital.

Although the Punjab government transferred the incomplete Mother and Child Hospital project from the federal government and approved Rs9.5 billion PC-I to grant it the status of a 400-bed Children's Hospital, work on the project did not begin this year.

Similarly, despite the foundation stone of the Rawalpindi Institute of Urology and Kidney Transplant being laid in 2012, kidney and liver transplant procedures could not be initiated in Rawalpindi.

While the project has since been transferred to PKLI Lahore, emergency OPD and dialysis facilities are currently available at PKLI Rawalpindi.