The Maharashtra state government approved several infrastructure projects in and around Mumbai that could make your daily commute as well as weekend travel smoother and faster. But none are likely to be ready before 2019.
Among the key projects cleared when the cabinet committee on infrastructure on Monday approved work worth Rs.52,000 crore are the Tikuji-ni-wadi (Thane)-Borivli tunnel under the Sanjay Gandhi National Park, a new 12 km tunnel through the Lonavla hills for a road parallel to the existing ghat section of the Mumbai-Pune expressway , and a six-lane bridge parallel to the existing Vashi creek bridge.
Interestingly , the new Vashi creek bridge that will make the bridge section 12 lane wide to match the existing width of the rest of Sion-Panvel highway will cost Rs.800 crore, almost double the cost that was pegged in 2010.
Greener transport options like ropeways, with each gondola capable of carrying up to 70 passengers, were discussed between Thane and Borivli across SGNP and between Ghatkopar (Kannamwar Nagar) and Navi Mumbai (Ghansoli) across the creek, in the meeting CM Devendra Fadnavis had with PWD minister Chandrakant Patil, MSRDC minister Eknath Shinde, irrigation minister Girish Mahajan, housing minister Prakash Mehta, minister of state for finance Deepak Kesarkar, and MSRDC MD Radheshyam Mopalwar. “We are toying with these ideas to make movement faster and cheaper for which safety , environment and other aspects are being studied,“ said a high-level Mantralaya official.
Fadnavis has asked the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) that will implement the projects to complete them by the end of 2019. Sources said he asked MSRDC to fix a target of six months to get the environment clearances for burrowing a tunnel below the SGNP .
The Mumbai-Nagpur expressway , which also got its final approval, will be built parallel to the existing road via Aurangabad and will be a greenfield project so that land acquisition does not become costlier for the state, said senior officials.
The augmentation of the Mumbai-Pune expressway by building the nearly 12 km tunnel-bridge section will reduce the journey time between the two cities by 30 minutes and will separate the old highway and expressway traffic completely . In the existing scenario, they meet in the expressway's ghat section, leading often to crawling traffic.
An elevated road on the Thane-Ghodbunder road and between Bhiwandi and Shilphata via Kalyan will make the movement of vehicles through the metropolitan region much faster as cars travelling to Panvel, Navi Mumbai and Dombivili from Bhiwandi, Kalyan, Borivili and Thane can skip much of the traffic snarls.
A four-lane connector between Pune expressway and Goa highway (Wakan-Pali-Khopoli road) will be built for Rs.500 crore. “The Wakan-Pali-Khopoli connector presently exists but is not wide enough to take care of a major switchover of vehicles from one highway to another. The expansion will improve port connectivity as well,“ said a source.
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