Road network is considered important infrastructure for a country. Among different transportation infrastructure, road is considered basic structure.Every year government allocates and spend huge amount of money in construction and maintenance of road. After the promulgation of federal constitution in 2015, the road construction has been carried out by central, province and local level. The constitution has divided the power and responsibility to different tiers of government.
Schedule 5 of constitution states that jurisdiction of national highway comes under federal government. Schedule 6 provides the jurisdiction of provincial highway to province government and schedule 8 provides the jurisdiction of local, rural and agricultural roads under local level. Department of Road is the central government executing agency for national highway network. Department of local infrastructure supports local level and province government for implementation of project. Similarly, department of urban development and building construction also supports local level in construction of urban roads and urban planning. However sometimes there arises conflict between these departments regarding jurisdiction. After the formation of province government, province government is executing road infrastructure through transportation directorate under ministry of physical infrastructure development. Under the transportation directorate, road infrastructure development offices are executing the projects directly. Federal parliament should formulate road act with the essence of the constitution. Similarly, provincial government and local government are required to formulate policies, acts & regulation on the matter of road.
Basically, roads are classified as per use of materials, location & function, traffic volume, economy, traffic types, rigidity and Topography.
a. Based on Materials
1. Earthen road
2. Gravel road
3. Murrum road
4. Kankar road
5. WBM (Water bound Macadam) road
6. Bituminous road
7. Concrete road
b. Based on Location & functions
1. National highways
2. Provincial highways
3. District roads
4. Urban roads
5. Local roads
6. Agricultural roads
c. Based on traffic volume
1. Light traffic
2. Medium traffic
3. High traffic
d. Based on Economy
1. Low cost roads
2. Medium cost roads
3. High cost road
e. Based on Traffic type
1. Pedestrian ways
2. Cycle tracks
3. Motorways
f. Based on Rigidity
1. Flexible roads
2. Rigid roads
g. Based on Topography
1. Plain area road
2. Hilly area road
h. Based on weather
1. All weather roads
2. Fair weather roads
Nepal Road standard 2070 has classified road as administration classification and technical classification.
A. Administrative classification
1. National highways- These roads are designated by H followed by two digits number. These roads connect east west and north south of the nation. These roads shall be main arterial routes passing through length and breadth of country.
2. Feeder roads- These roads are designated by F followed by 3 digits number. These roads connect district headquarter, major economic center and tourism center to national highway.
3. District roads- These roads connect the production center and market within the district and connects with main highways.
4. Urban roads- Urban roads are road serving within municipality.
B. Technical classification
1. Class I- These roads are high standard routes with divided carriage way and access control. Annual Daily Traffic (ADT) is more than 20000 PCU with design speed of 120 km/hr.
2. Class II- It has ADT (5000-2000) PCU in 20 years perspective period. Design speed is 100 km/hr.
3. Class III- It has ADT (2000-5000) PCU in 20 years perspective period. Design speed is 80 km/hr.
4. Class IV- It has ADT less than 2000. Design speed is 60 km/hr
Plain & rolling terrain | Mountainous & steep road | |
National Highways | Class I, Class II | Class II, Class III |
Feeder Roads | Class II, Class III | Class III, Class IV |
Approximate equivalence with road classification in other countries are:
Class I – Express ways
Class II – Arterial roads
Class III – Collector roads
Class Iv – Local roads
source: Nepal Road Standard, NRS-2070
Rupee Exchange Rate
0 Comments