Mumbai: It appears that the Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority (MMRDA) has no choice but to build underground Metros now, even though it involves three times the cost of an elevated line, which the authorities say involve umpteen hurdles that cause delays in the completion of projects.
Right To Information activist Anil Galgali, who had sought information from the MMRDA on the progress of its metro projects, was told that the “cost of construction of metro elevated pattern would approximately cost Rs2.5-Rs3 billion per km. In comparison, the cost of construction of the underground Metro would be almost three times the cost of an elevated metro.”
The first phase of the metro route of Dahisar-Charkop-Bandra-Mankhurd, which is being started from Dahisar to DN Nagar, will cost Rs63.90 billion. Similarly the other route of Andheri East to Dahisar East is slated to cost Rs60.56 billion. The Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ (Andheri) line is expected to cost Rs231.36 billion. “This means that if the same is developed as an elevated line, the cost would be Rs118.60 billion, which is now costing Rs355.82 billion for all the three routes. As per this decision, a whopping Rs237.21 billion is being spent extra just for the route being an underground one,” he says.
Galgali, who had also sought the copy of the decision to undertake the work of underground Metro instead of the elevated though being cheaper, was provided with the copy of the minutes of the meeting of the 43rd Empowered Committee. The decision took into account the lessons learnt in execution of the Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar Metro One project and the comparison submitted by the ground status report to the Mumbai Transformation Support Unit, which was approved by Director B.C. Khatua on April 26, 2013.
MMRDA Commissioner U.P.S. Madan was of the view that the streets of Mumbai were very narrow and congested, due to which the Metro One project got delayed and hence in future the government agency decided to go in for underground Metro routes in Mumbai, except for some areas in eastern Mumbai which are less congested. He was of the view that though the underground pattern is very costly, it would save requirements for arranging land for the project and tackling encroachments.
Moreover, also taken into account were traffic woes that led to constant delays in project execution and thereby raised the cost of projects further, stated Madan.
The Transport study 2008 had proposed a total of 25 routes for Metro rail in the whole of Mumbai Metropolitan Region of which around eight are within Mumbai and the rest in Thane, Kalyan, Bhiwandi, Kanjurmarg, Navi Mumbai, New Airport, Uran and Nhava Sheva.
