Mumbai: In the coming year, Mumbai may finally add two new Metro lines to its measly Metro rail network of 11.4 kilometres — seven years after the first corridor was opened for public use.
The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) is aiming at commissioning two elevated Metro rail corridors in Mumbai’s congested western suburbs — an 18.5-kilometre corridor from Dahisar to D.N. Nagar and a 16.5-kilometre line from Dahisar East to Andheri East.
This will take the Metro rail network in Mumbai to 46.4 kilometres, nearly 17 years after the then Congress-Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) government came up with the first Mumbai Metro master plan.
“By May end or June (next year), we can start commercial operations of the two lines. It may be a matter of one or two months here and there because issues due to Covid-19 are still giving us a lot of surprises every day, and a setback of a few days too creates a ripple effect,” R.A. Rajeev, MMRDA commissioner, told ThePrint.
Covid setbacks
Even as the MMRDA is at the fag end of completing the construction of the two new Metro lines, there are issues due to the pandemic that are slowing down its pace.
For instance, a night curfew, which Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray imposed in all urban areas of the state from 11 pm to 6 am from 22 December to 5 January, has upset the work schedule of the two lines.
Rajeev said the MMRDA is trying to seek an exemption for work on infrastructure projects.
“Then some parts of the Metro are lying at a Japan airport. They are not getting a flight to load it and send it. A few Japanese experts were to come to help with the propulsion systems of the trains. They have all stopped coming,” he said.
Work on the two Metro lines was also hit earlier this year when a large number of migrant labourers employed for the two corridors left the city amid the Covid crisis.
However, despite the stumbling blocks, the MMRDA is confident of getting the delivery of the first train next month and starting trial runs on the two corridors early next year.
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The various deadlines
The Dahisar-D.N. Nagar and Dahisar East-Andheri East Metro lines were conceived by the BJP-led government under CM Devendra Fadnavis.
The then government ambitiously set an initial deadline of 2019, the year of the Lok Sabha and Maharashtra assembly elections, for the two lines to be commissioned.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had performed the ground breaking ceremony for both the Metro corridors in October 2015. The MMRDA finalised the contracts for the projects in 2016 and the construction started the same year.
State government officials conceded that the 2019 deadline was too optimistic, and that in reality, the civil works, procurement of rolling stock and certain other technical clauses took longer than the former Fadnavis government had hoped. The deadline was moved to 2020, but the projects suffered a setback due to manpower and logistical issues created by the pandemic.
Last week, Maharashtra CM Uddhav Thackeray, who has mostly preferred to stay indoors throughout the pandemic, visited construction sites on the two Metro lines to review the progress.
The two Metro lines
The Dahisar-D.N. Nagar Metro and the Dahisar East-Andheri East Metro will have 17 stations and 13 stations, respectively.
The lines are expected to immediately cater to a ridership of 4.07 lakh and 5.28 lakh, respectively, when they are commissioned in 2021.
The two lines promise to improve connectivity within the far northwestern suburbs of Mumbai and will also intersect with the city’s only Metro corridor so far — the 11.4-kilometre Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar elevated line.
Other than these two lines, the construction is underway on four more Metro rail corridors in Mumbai with a collective network of about 104 kilometres.
The MMRDA has also started initial works such as soil testing and barricading of road portions for three more Metro corridors with a collective network of 41.1 kilometres.
All these Metro lines carry a deadline between 2022 and 2024.
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As long as penguins in cahoots with Baramati corrupts are in power, Mumbai will continue to suffer the brunt of parochial politics. Within 2 years probably by 2022-23 remaining corporate houses will shift their base to Bengaluru/Hyderabad/NCR. Mark my words.