Eastern Freeway : Snapshot

Worli - Sewri Connector snippets

The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has decided to appoint a developer by the year-end to build a 4.5km elevated road from Sewri to Worli, near the end of the sea link, at a cost of about Rs.200 crore.
The road will be attached to the upcoming eastern freeway, between Princes Dock (towards Colaba) and Chembur. The Chembur end will eventually be connected to the Eastern Express highway in Ghatkopar and Mankhurd on the Sion-Panvel highway.
Similarly, the elevated road will have connectivity with the proposed sea link between Sewri and Nhava, also known as the Mumbai Trans Harbour Link (MTHL). Connectivity will be through a rotary or cloverleaf structure, offering entry and exit towards all four ends: Worli, Chembur, Navi Mumbai and Colaba.
While the Pedder Road flyover is being opposed by South Mumbai residents and is yet to be approved by the Ministry of Environment & Forests (MoEF), the coastal road till Cuffe Parade will require amendments in the Environment Act itself. Permission for both is expected to take two to three years. In the meantime, MMRDA officials said they can build the elevated road.
 “Instead of taking the traditional Marine Drive-Pedder Road route, traffic on the western corridor, over probably three years, will be signal-free between Worli and Princes Dock through this connector,” said MMRDA commissioner Rahul Asthana.
 “Although railway permission is not yet in to build a bridge above Elphinstone bridge, work will start by January 2013 to avoid delay. The bridge portion will be built only when permission is given,” said another MMRDA official.
 “The project will decongest Pedder Road in the absence of the 4km flyover and nearly 10km coastal road between Worli and Cuffe Parade,” said a senior MMRDA technocrat. While the eastern freeway too will decongest Dr Ambedkar Road, Eastern Express highway and Sion-Panvel road, the sea link will bring Navi Mumbai closer to South Mumbai.

Day lighting on the Eastern Freeway

One of Mumbai's most ambitious road projects will see the light of day today literally.
Engineers digging a pair of tunnels under the BARC hills near Chembur are scheduled to break through the other end by late afternoon or early evening, capping almost three years of excavation in tricky terrain and clearing one of the toughest parts of the 17-km Eastern Freeway.
In engineering parlance, Thursday's event is called Day-lighting, a reference to the rush of sunlight that will fill the tunnel as the last rock crumbles.
The 505-metre twin tunnel is part of the Eastern Freeway which will connect P'Dmello Road to the Eastern Express Highway in Ghatkopar. The Freeway will be a traffic signal-less, access controlled road.
The Eastern Freeway, which is being built at a cost of nearly Rs 1,000 crore, will take you to Ghatkopar from P D’Mello Road in less than half an hour. Currently, it takes anything between an hour and an hour-and-a-half.
The MMRDA has spent close to Rs 80 crore on the tunnel and has rehabilitated close to 5,000 structures, including 30 shrines, while laying down the Freeway.