The Expressways of India are the highest class of roads in India. As per NHAI and Indian Roads Congress, expressways are access controlledhighways with a divided carriageway, designed for high speed vehicular movement and heavy traffic.[1] As of December 2024, the total length of expressways in India was 6,059km (3,765mi), with 11,127.69km (6,914.43mi) under construction. In expressways there is a central reservation or median that separates the flow travelling in opposite directions. Entrance and exits are provided only by grade separatedinterchanges. The interchanges may be system interchanges (such as cloverleaf, three-way, trumpet) used with other national or state highways or be service interchanges (such as SPDI) used with smaller roads.[2] In contrast, National highways may or may not be divided by a median and may or may not have access control.[3] Some highways, built by State Governments, which may be fully access controlled or may be limited access controlled, are declared or named as expressways by their respective State Governments.[4]
As of 2024, the longest expressway in India is the partially-opened Delhi–Mumbai Expressway (Phase-III) at 1,015km (631mi), which was opened in December 18, 2024,[5] and the widest expressway is the Delhi – Gurgaon section of the Dwarka Expressway with 16 lanes, which was opened in 2024.
Development and timeline
Greenfield Expressways in India are designed as 12-lane wide Expressways with the initial construction of 8 lanes with maximum speed set as 120km/h for all type of vehicles. Land for 4-lane future expansion is reserved in the center of the expressways. Greenfield Expressways are designed to avoid inhabited areas and go through new alignments to bring development to new areas and to reduce land acquisition costs and construction timelines. The Delhi–Mumbai Expressway is an example of a new 12-lane approach with initial 8-lane construction.
Bharatmala is an ecosystem of road development which includes tunnels, bridges, elevated corridors, flyovers, overpass, interchanges, bypasses, ring roads etc. to provide shortest & optimized connectivity to multiple places, it is a centrally-sponsored and funded road and highways project of the Government of India[6] with a target of constructing 83,677km[7] of new highways over the next five years, was started in 2017 as well as conversion of 4 lane highways into 6 lane Brownfield expressways & some state highways into NH/NE.[8] Phase I of the Bharatmala project involves the construction of 34,800km of highways (including the remaining projects under NHDP) at an estimated cost of ₹5.35 lakhcrore by 2021–22.[9]
Brownfield National Highway Project is the widening/re-development of existing National Highways. The upgradation of highway is a Brownfield Expressway Project which has high traffic demand and is a part of both rural and urban setup. The upgradation is carried from 4 Lane to 6 Lane on EPC mode such as NH-709A.[10] 43,000km state highways have been converted to National Highways in last 8 years.[11]
The majority of the investment required for constructing expressways comes from the central government. Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra are the only states which are investing in building expressways through dedicated expressway corporations.[12]
The National Highways Authority of India operating under the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways will be in-charge of the construction and maintenance of expressways.[13] The National Highways Development Project by the government of India aims to expand the country's current expressway network and plans to add an additional 18,637km of greenfield expressways by 2025 apart from building 4 lane greenfield national highways of 50,000km length.[14][15] Currently NHDP Phase-6 and NHDP Phase-7 construction is going on along with Bharatmala project.
The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways is set to unveil a plan for constructing 50,000 km of new expressways by 2037 in the first 100 days of the new government.The program, replacing Bharatmala, aligns with Vision 2047 and aims to reduce logistic costs and modernize road infrastructure.[16]
Economic Corridors/Industrial Corridors
Economic Corridors of India or Industrial Corridors of India, 44 corridors 26,200km (16,300mi) were identified and 9,000km (5,600mi) will be taken up in phase-I, they exclude 6 National Corridors, they include:[17] 66 8,000km (5,000mi) inter-corridors (IC) & 116 7,500km (4,700mi) feeder routes (FR) were identified for Bharatmala.[17]
This list contains expressways built by National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and declared or named as expressways by Government of India. These Expressways are run through one or more states or UTs; some of these are designated with "NE" tag while some are not but both of the types are National Expressways.[18]
Legends
Fully operationalUnder constructionPartially operational and partially under constructionPlanned but construction not started
The following list refers to the expressways which passing through more than one state/UT and connect places from different states/UTs. Bypass or spur expressways are not included in following list.
Major expressways by NHAI passing through more than one state/UT
The following list refers to the expressways built by NHAI to connect areas within the state. Bypass or spur expressways are not included in following list.
Bypass Expressways such as ring roads, bypass roads, freeways and elevated roads are used to bypass city core traffic. These are declared as expressways by Government of India. These direct heavy traffic to the outskirts freeing city roads of traffic. This also allows outside traffic to directly pass the city instead of going through it further limiting traffic within a city.
These expressways are built by State Governments in their respective states and declared as expressways by that State Government, not by Government of India. Most of these highways contain characteristics of expressways.
Legends
Fully operationalUnder constructionPartially operational and partially under constructionPlanned but construction not started
↑ "NOTICE INVITING TENDER"(PDF). MAHARASHTRA STATE ROAD DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION LIMITED, MUMBAI(A Govt. of Maharashtra Undertaking). Retrieved 12 October 2022.
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