Hill Roads

Hilly regions have steep topography, difficult and hazardous terrain, and extreme climatic conditions. Planning, alignment, design, construction, and maintenance of road in hilly areas are quite different and pose difficult problems in comparison to those for roads in plain terrain.

Our country has vast areas located in hilly regions of Northern and North-Eastern regions and border areas of India. Apart from these, there are several hilly and mountainous areas in Western ghats and several other interior parts of the country.

Some Special Features of Hill Roads are the following:

1)    Hill road should be aligned along with the stable side of the hill slope in order to prevent landslides.

2)    Existence of number of hairpin bends, sharp horizontal curves.

3)    Construction of an effective surface and sub-surface drainage

4)    Existence of large numbers of cross-drainage structures like bridges and culverts.

The Border Roads Organization (Gove. Of India) has classified hill roads as given below:

(a)    National Highway

(b)    Class 9 (6 m. wide for 3-tonnes vehicles)

(c)     Class 5 (4.5 m. wide for 1-tonnes vehicles)

(d)    Class 3 (2.45 to 3.65 m. wide for jeeps)