The  mainline will feature eight lanes, four lanes in each direction separated by a median with continuous service roads

By Ayman Adly/Staff Reporter

The Ain Khalid Underpass, part of the ambitious Salwa Road project, will open for traffic by the end of this week and the upgraded 7km part of the expressway stretching from the Midmac Interchange  to the Industrial Interchange will be completed by the third quarter of this year, a top official has said.

Public Works Authority (Ashghal) president  Nasser al-Mawlawi yesterday said that initially only two lanes (each way) of the Ain Khalid tunnel would be opened and the whole project would be finished by September.

The  mainline will feature eight lanes, four lanes in each direction separated by a median with continuous service roads. There will be four two-level interchanges along this section with the mainline of Salwa Road placed as an underpass beneath the crossroads to allow free flowing mainline traffic. The project will provide a strategic corridor between the centre of Doha and the Saudi Arabian border.

Ashghal’s Expressway programme,  a nationwide road infrastructure programme, will deliver more than 30 highway projects across the country, including new and upgraded freeways and arterial roads as well as substantial upgrades to existing roads.

Al-Mawlawi said the purpose of the partial opening of the tunnel was to make room for the completion of the external works of the project, including  murals and other decorations. He said Ashghal had a comprehensive scheme to decorate not only the new Salwa Road but streets  throughout Qatar.

Qatar Museums Authority chairperson HE Sheikha Mayassa bint Hamad al-Thani and al-Mawlawi visited the new tunnel, where French-Tunisian graffiti artist eL Seed has finished working on some of the murals. QMA’s Public Art Department and Ashghal have commissioned eL Seed to embellish four underground tunnels on the Salwa Road.  

He uses traditional calligraphy in an innovative manner to express themes of national interest. He employs a form of painting which he calls “calligraffiti”. Among his assistants are a young Qatari woman and two young Qatari men, all graduates of local arts colleges.

Work on the Salwa Road project began in July 2010. “In two or three months, other intersections will be opened as external works are being completed,” al-Mawlawi pointed out, adding the main parts of the project would be completed by the third quarter of this year. The project’s total cost is  QR1.59bn.