BMC plans two new flyovers at a cost of over

MUMBAI: Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) plans to build two elevated flyovers to connect the Sion-Panvel highway with the Ghatkopar-Mankhurd Link Road flyover at a cost of over ₹918 crore to allow motorists to bypass a busy traffic signal linking the two. One flyover will be for vehicles coming from the Ghatkopar-Mankhurd Link Road flyover to Vashi, and the other from Vashi to Ghatkopar-Mankhurd Link Road flyover. The connectors will cost more than the Ghatkopar-Mankhurd Link Road flyover constructed at a cost of ₹700 crore.
The exorbitant cost and the timing of the tender have raised questions among commuters, even as they agree that easing the traffic is necessary.
“The junction to the Ghatkopar-Mankhurd Link Road going to the Eastern Express Highway while coming from Vashi is certainly jammed due to the bottleneck and needs clearing, but the cost of over ₹900 crore is crazy,” said Rahul, a Powai resident, who travels to Vashi on the route. “This is also an example of terrible planning on the BMC’s part, as the Ghatkopar-Mankhurd flyover was completed by the civic body in 2021, and ideally, this should have been included in the plan. Instead, it is being built now and we will have to suffer some more years of barricades and construction.”
However, an official from the BMC’s bridges department, who did not want to be named, justified the cost. “The elevated arms are going to be 2 + 2 lanes of over 1.5km, and considering the quantum of work, design, material, quantity of material required, the cost has been calculated as per the approved rates. Work on both arms will be started simultaneously, with portions where permission is acquired started first till other permissions come.”
Also, located at a place which has many crucial utility lines, a significant obstacle in the flyovers’ construction will be obtaining permissions from various authorities. Elevated high voltage lines of MSETCL and TATA Power, a GAIL gas pipeline, a HPCL black oil pipeline, water mains and sewage lines pass through and under the road’s alignment.
Permission will be required from the Public Works Department (PWD) as the Sion-Panvel highway falls under it; the Maharashtra Coastal Zone Management Authority and the Mangroves Department due to the proposed flyovers’ proximity to the creek and mangroves; and the railways as one of the flyovers falls in the railway buffer zone.
The deadline for the tender for the connector-flyovers has been fixed for October 3 and the deadline for construction has been fixed at 30 months.