Chandigarh, May 28 -- Even as the first phase of the Tribune flyover project is in limbo after the Punjab and Haryana high court (HC) stayed the felling of nearly 500 trees, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) is planning a second phase of the project to decongest one of the busiest entry corridors in the city. While the first phase is a 1.6-km stretch, extending from Government Medical College and Hospital (GMCH), Sector 32, to the railway overbridge on Dakshin Marg, the second phase is to begin near the Poultry Farm Chowk-Hallomajra junction, where the phase-1 flyover tapers off, and extend up to the Zirakpur flyover on the Ambala-Chandigarh highway. The tentative cost of this 4.5-km elevated road will be around Rs.350 crore. The MoRTH has appointed a consultant, CivilMantra Infracon Pvt Ltd, to prepare a detailed project report (DPR) for the extended stretch. The original plan, developed in 2016, was to have a 5.5-km-long flyover stretching from near GMCH-32 to the Zirakpur border. But the plan ran into multiple hurdles - high costs (nearly Rs.800-900 crore), environmental concerns and litigation delays. The urban planning constraints under Chandigarh's Master Plan, which discourages extensive flyover construction, further complicated its execution. As a result, the project was scaled down to a 1.6-km flyover at Tribune Chowk, now referred to as phase-1. Over time, traffic experts flagged that a standalone flyover at Tribune Chowk would merely shift congestion to nearby junctions such as Poultry Farm Chowk, Hallomajra, and the Zirakpur stretch. This led to a renewed push to revive the remaining portion of the original plan. The phased rollout will effectively mark a return to the original concept, albeit in smaller, more manageable segments. According to the plan, the second phase is to have a six-lane elevated carriageway to handle heavy traffic flow, multiple underpasses and slip roads at key junctions for decongestion of major bottlenecks such as old Airport Chowk, Hallomajra T-point and Poultry Farm intersection. The corridor is part of a broader plan to make the National Highway-5 fully signal-free while improving travel time and safety for commuters moving between Chandigarh, Mohali, and Zirakpur....