COMPUTER AIDED DESIGN OF RURAL ROADS

Abstract

Transport and communication act as a catalyst of socioeconomic development of a region. These activate and foster the process of development in all the sectors of economy including agriculture, health, industry, education and other social amenities. Rural roads in particular, link scattered settlements into an integrated system so that they can derive benefits from each other. In the sphere of agriculture an integrated rural road network facilitates farm mechanism, use of improved agriculture inputs like fertilizers, pesticides and high yielding seeds, development of poultry, dairy farming, and mobilisation of local man power and distribution of marketable surplus to consumption centers. Therefore, for an integrated development of rural areas, communication linkages have to be provided to all villages. Historically attempts were made to develop rural roads soon after India attained independence. Since then, considerable length of rural roads has been constructed under a host of programmes, especially community development programme schemes for rural roads, food for work program, minimum needs program, etc. In spite of several development programmes undertaken in the past, the rural road connectivity still remains very poor, with several states having below 50% settlement connectivity. With a view to give a boost to rural road connectivity, under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, a massive nation wide program of road connectivity has been launched. The program, known as Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) aims at connecting all the settlements with population of 500 or above.