Following the opening, Fakieh said three more road projects would be commissioned in the current year. “A comprehensive plan to build bridges on 90 intersections in the city was drawn up. Work on 30 intersections have already been started,” he said.

He added that there were some obstacles in the implementation of work on a few projects. “However, efforts are under way to remove the hurdles,” he said.

The new overpass is 15.2 meters wide and 800 meters long.

The project has been constructed in three levels: an overpass on Hira Street, a ground-level intersection and an underpass on Prince Majed Road.

The mayor said a comprehensive plan to develop areas to the east of the Haramain Expressway would be ready in three months. He said municipal services are being extended to existing plots in those areas.

The mayor said the municipality had suspended services to buildings that were blamed for last year’s floods in the city.

The courses of floodwater have been studied and marked with the cooperation of geologists and other experts, he said, adding that a number of plots have been earmarked to be handed over to the Housing Authority.

Saeed Bafehaid, director of bridges and tunnels in the municipality, said the municipality aims to reduce the traffic bottlenecks on major roads in the city, such as Prince Majed Road, King Fahd Road, King Abdulaziz Road, Madinah Road, Makkah Road, Palestine Road, Sari Street and Prince Muhammad Road.

He said Jeddah experiences more traffic problems than any other city in the Kingdom because of its population of three million with a growth rate of more than 4 percent. The city has more than one million cars. He said the city’s population is expected to reach 4.4 million by 2020 when the traffic situation will become even worse.