The Lagos state government has said the removal of six roundabouts along the Lekki-Epe Expressway has saved residents and motorists N240 million daily and about N87 billion annually. Habib Haruna, chief press secretary to the Lagos state governor, said this in a statement.
“The Lekki-Epe road, as at the time it was reconstructed, was designed to accommodate about 30,000 vehicles per day, but the vehicular movement along the axis had since increased to over 50,000 daily, thus necessitating plans to mitigate the impact on traffic. The traffic situation in the area was further worsened by the delays occasioned by the humongous roundabouts along the corridor with an average size of about 2,800sqm which is four plots of land” he said.
The six roundabouts removed are Ikate, Chisco, Jakande, Igbo Efon, Chevron and Victoria Garden City (VGC).
“Average travel time from the Abraham Adesanya to Lekki Admiralty Tollgate was about two hours characterized by huge delays especially at the roundabouts. This unpalatable and unacceptable traffic situation prompted Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode, governor of Lagos State to commission the removal of the roundabouts under the Junction Improvement Works (JIW) project. The project involves detailed traffic surveys (Manual Classified Count, Turning Movement Count, Journey Time and Delay survey, e.t.c), Conceptual, Detailed Engineering Designs and Construction executed by Planet Projects Limited (PPL). Pre and Post JIW traffic surveys carried out by PPL shows that journey time between Abraham Adesanya and Lekki Admiralty Tollgate has reduced drastically from 2hours to about 36minutes, thus, saving Lekki – Ajah residents (with 60,487 average daily traffic) about N240 million daily and N87 billion yearly based on journey time and fuel savings analysis” the report said.
The affected roundabouts were replaced with traffic lights, expansion of the roads and provision of dedicated turning lanes as well as additional lay-bys.
