JEDDAH: New lanes have been opened on the Third Ring Road and Prince Saud Al-Faisal Road in Makkah, reducing travel times on affected routes by more than 90 percent, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
The Third Ring Road opening includes an additional 1.5 km section connecting the Prince Mutib and Grand Mosque intersections via the Prince Sultan intersection.
Traffic has also begun using the final part of Prince Saud Al-Faisal Road, linking the Prince Mohammed bin Salman corridor to Abdulqadir Koshak Street through the Prince Naif bin Abdulaziz intersection.
The openings, by the Royal Commission for Makkah City and Holy Sites, are part of infrastructure projects to ease congestion, improve road safety and facilitate travel for residents, visitors and pilgrims, particularly during Hajj and Umrah seasons.
Work on Makkah’s Third Ring Road has been ongoing for more than a decade. In 2019, the Makkah Province Development Authority announced that work would resume, saying about 14 km of the road had been completed.
At the time, the authority said work had stopped about three years earlier, while a section opened in 2014 was easing congestion on Madinah Road and the old Jeddah-Makkah road.
The authority’s 2019 plans included a 3.2 km link between Hajj Street and the Tanim area in northern Makkah, passing through Algeria Street and Rei Dhakhir. It also planned to complete an 11 km section from the Al-Maskhouta intersection in the south through Aziziyah and the Jamarat area to Hajj Street in the north, which it said would complete the Third Ring Road network.
In 2012, Makkah Gov. Prince Khaled Al-Faisal, then chairman of the Makkah Province Development Authority, signed two contracts worth nearly SR2 billion for ring road projects in the city.
These covered completion of a 5 km section of the Second Ring Road and construction of the third phase of the 14.5 km Third Ring Road. Both projects were part of the King Abdullah Project for the Development of Makkah and the Holy Sites.
