Hyderabad to have plastic roads?

Sai Kumar, secretary of Telangana Common Men Forum, made a presentation to P Ravinder Rao, chief engineer, Roads and Buildings department, recently to lay plastic roads instead of tar roads. “Roads in the city are often damaged and lie in a dilapidated situation. Instead of laying tar roads, plastic roads are better as it has the ability to hold up and lasts up to eight years. Plastic items such as carry bags, cups, packing materials used for chocolates, biscuits etc should be cut in small sizes and heated up to 165 degree centigrade and added to bitumen to lay plastic roads.

Also these roads are cheaper than tar roads and it has already been laid in Gujarat and Tamil Nadu,” explained Sai Kumar.“Plastic roads could become a reality if plastic waste is used appropriately. We find lots of waste lying on the streets. We can adopt 8 per cent as the optimum plastic content for blending with the bitumen to construct plastic roads. Bitumen of grades 60/70 or 80/100 can be used as binder as in case of conventional method,” he added. Sai Kumar however noted that the engineer was disinterested in the idea.