Join us at Facebook

In the last four years, the Delhi government has spent over Rs 8,500 crore (Rs 850 million) to build flyovers and widen roads, another Rs 7,000 crore (Rs 700 million) on the second phase of the Metro rail project and over Rs 2,000 crore (Rs 200 million) for new ‘low floor’ CNG buses. “Faster moving vehicles and better public transport have meant a lower emission footprint in Delhi,” said Sarath Guttikunda, associate professor at the institute, who led the study that compares vehicular emissions in 2008 across 20 big and small cities of India.

In comparison, Mumbai’s infrastructure, despite the opening of the recent sealink between Bandra and Worli, has improved little. Both cities record a 10-12 per cent increase in the number of vehicles every year. “Carbon dioxide (CO2) and particulate matter emission load from Mumbai buses, three-wheelers and taxis is more than four times that from similar vehicles in Delhi,” said Guttikunda.

President Pratibha Patil performed the bhoomi puja for the 27-station project, taken up by Reliance Infrastructure Ltd, which will provide a vital link between Navi Mumbai and the Western suburbs and connect Charkop in the north to Bandra and Mankhurd in the east.

She said, “Metro and Monorail are like capillaries and veins. The more they grow, more the body functions. With Metro and Monorail coming, the city will grow and progress.”

On taking forward the underground Colaba-Bandra corridor stuck in the slow lane because of its high estimated cost of Rs 12,000 crore, Reddy said the Public Private Partnership (PPP) model may not be suitable because of the huge cost.

He suggested an equity between the Centre and the state, on the lines of the Delhi Metro model, which, in fact, had been considered and shelved earlier by the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), the nodal agency for the project.

Reddy said, “The estimated cost of Line III (Colaba-Bandra corridor) is over Rs 10,000 crore and therefore may not be suitable for the PPP model. The Centre is prepared to invest 50 per cent equity for a JV, in addition to soft loans from the Japan Bank for International Cooperation and subordinate debt.”

However, MMRDA is not in a rush to take Reddy’s offer.

“We want to start work on Corridor III at the earliest. We’re awaiting a report on commercial exploitation of underground stations. Commercial exploitation would lower the viability gap funding (VGF) substantially and then, we’ll can take a call on the model to be adopted. Once VGF comes down, we still have the PPP option open,” said Ratnakar Gaikwad, Metropolitan Commissioner. The report is expected in two months.

Earlier, MMRDA had planned to adopt the Delhi Metro model as the VGF of nearly Rs 9,000 crore had made the PPP model unviable. After constituting a Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation, the authority subsequently decided to shelve the plan.

i) Mumbai Urban Transport Project (MUTP) for improvement of suburban rail services in Mumbai area, which has both road and rail components. The estimated cost of the rail component of the project is Rs. 4174.40 crore. It is partly funded by a loan from World Bank i.e. The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) loan and International Development Association (IDA). Credit earmarked for the rail component of the project are US $ 304.5 million and US $ 60 million respectively from IBRD and IDA. The total amount utilized under this loan upto March 31, 2009 is US $ 132.072 million of IBRD loan and US $ 42.47 million of IDA credit.

ii) Modernization of Signalling between Ghaziabad and Kanpur at an estimated cost of Euro 108.5 million is being partly funded by loan from Kreditanstalt fur Wiederafbau (KfW), Germany. The loan amount is Euro 94.5 million. The total amount utilized under this loan upto March 31, 2009 is 24.028 million Euros.

iii) The Asian Development Bank has extended a loan to finance the Railway Sector Improvement Project with the objective of enhancing capacity of the rail network and improving operational efficiency/safety. The subprojects to be funded from the loan are principally in the Golden Quadrilateral and its Diagonals and Port Connectivity projects. The estimated total cost of the various projects under this loan is Rs. 990.82 crore. The loan amount is US $ 212.3 million. The total amount utilized under this loan upto March 31, 2009 is US $ 126.115 million.

This information was given by the Minister of State for Ministry of Railways, Shri K. H. Muniyappa in a written reply in Lok Sabha today.

The Mumbai Railway Vikas Corporation (MRVC) is finally out with the
concept note for Mumbai Urban Transport Project (MUTP) III that will
be ready between 2012 and 2018. P C Sehgal, MD of MRVC, said, “The
plan for MUTP III has been prepared based on various suggestions by
Central and Western Railway, state government bodies and commuter
feedback. Right now it only reflects transportation needs. It needs
to be studied further.†The MUTP phase one is already being
implemented and will be completed by June 2010. The second phase,
sanctioned in the railway budget, is targeted for completion by 2013.
MUTP-1 and 2 will segregate suburban trains from outstation and
freight trains and peak crowding is expected to be around 335
passengers per coach.

PROJECT HIGHLIGHTS

EXTENDING HARBOUR LINE TO BALLARD PIER IN SOUTH MUMBAI THE NEED: This
will allow passengers to directly reach the heart of the city’s
business district and will lower the congestion around Chhatrapati
Shivaji Terminus. Also, the passenger load at CST will reduce with
Ballard Pier becoming the starting point for harbour trains.
Connectivity between offices at Navi Mumbai and South Mumbai will
thus be strengthened.

THE HURDLE: The existing rail line at Ballard Pier currently belongs
to the Mumbai Port Trust and connecting the harbour line to it will
be the biggest hurdle.

LOCAL TRAIN CORRIDOR ON VIRARBHIWANDI-DIVA-PANVEL LINE FOR BETTER MMR
CONNECTIVITY THE NEED: To avoid saturation on Central and Western
suburban railway lines, a third corridor connecting Virar-Bhiwandi-
Diva and Panvel is proposed. Also, commuters travelling from western
suburbs to Panvel will have a changing point at Dadar. This will
result in development of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (areas that
include Mumbai and suburbs up to Virar and Badlapur).

THE HURDLE: The only hurdle is the availability of rakes, otherwise
train services can be started immediately.

INCREASING LENGTH OF LOCAL TRAINS TO 15 OR 18 CARS THE NEED: Right
now over 16 people travel in one square meter area on local trains
during rush hour. There are currently 6.5 million train commuters,
which is growing at the rate of 4 per cent every year. In order to
cope with passenger load, the railways are studying the feasibility
of 15 to 18 car trains.
THE HURDLE: The length of all station platforms and distance between
signals will have to be increased to accommodate the increased number
of compartments.

QUADRUPLING HARBOUR LINE AND RUNNING 12-CAR TRAINS THE NEED: With an
increasing number of offices and residential townships coming up in
Navi Mumbai, the commuter rush on harbour line trains is growing
rapidly. To cope with the increased passenger load, Central Railways
either needs to increase the number of cars on each train or should
have more fast trains on the route halting at Belapur, Vashi,
Mankhurd, Wadala and Ballard Pier.

THE HURDLE: About the 15 per cent of the harbour line is an elevated
band. Increasing the length of stations to run 12 car trains here
will be a problem. Also, construction of additional lines will also
require of lot of restructuring and shifting of tracks passing
underneath.

BANDRA-KURLA SUBURBAN TRAIN CORRIDOR THE NEED: Bandra Kurla Complex
is the city’s new business district and has important offices like
NSE and the Diamond Market. Currently, transportation facilities to
BKC from Kurla and Bandra railway stations are insufficient. The
corridor will not only provide connectivity with BKC, but will also
add two more interchanging points for Central and Western railway
commuters.

THE HURDLE: The state government is planning to come up with a
monorail or connect the area with its Metro rail plan. The project
thus depends on the government’s priorities.

FIFTH AND SIXTH LINES ON THE BORIVLI-VIRAR SECTION AND THIRD AND
FOURTH LINES ON VIRAR DAHANU SECTION THE NEED: In order to expand its
suburban services up to Dahanu, the railways will require more tracks
in this section. Currently, a shuttle service runs between Virar and
Dahanu. However, it would not meet the increasing demand of
commuters.

THE HURDLE: Expansion of services will only be possible when there
are more rakes

THIRD LINE ON KALYAN-KARJAT AND KALYAN-KASARA LINES THE NEED:
Currently, the number of services beyond Kalyan has to be restricted
due to the availability of just two tracks. They handle the load of
suburban local services as well as long distance trains. The
additional track will separate the suburban and long distance
traffic.

THE HURDLE: The construction of the fifth and sixth line between
Thane and Kurla has taken over six years to complete, due to
encroachments and land acquisition issues. Similar problems might
occur on these lines too.

LOCAL TRAINS WITH CLOSED-DOOR ARRANGEMENT THE NEED: About 2,784
people have died after falling off local trains in the past year.
Therefore, MRVC has been talking about introducing trains with closed
doors.

THE HURDLE: The closed door trains will require airconditioning and
will increase the cost of commuting on trains as well. The closed
door trains will also reduce carrying capacity of each train.

There is a change in plan for the second monorail corridor between the Bandra-Kurla-Complex and the nearby suburban railway stations like Bandra and Sion.Contrary to the original plan of getting it financed by the Infrastructure Development Finance Company (IDFC), the Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) model would be adopted for the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority’s (MMRDA) proposed monorail corridor between Bandra station on the eastern side and the MMRDA headquarters.

“IDFC has entered into a joint venture agreement with Delhi Integrated Multi-Modal Transit System Ltd (DIMTS), a joint venture company with the Government of Delhi. They will now conduct a feasibility study on the corridor. They are likely to submit the report by October end. IDFC will not be financing it and we’re planning to implement it on a BOT model,” said R Ramana, Additional Chief, Transport and Communication, MMRDA. “The route may be extended to Sion station,” he added. The consultant is also expected to suggest the best alignment for the corridor.

According to the MMRDA, the project will address the growing demand for better transportation in the business district that sees at least 25,000-30,000 commuters during peak hours every day. The monorail would cover Kala Nagar-Diamond Bourse to Sion station from Bandra station (East).

The urban transport system in which the cars or rolling stocks move on a single beam in an elevated corridor is a quiet system — that offers least noise — with sleek exteriors and air-conditioned cars for added commuter comfort.

The Bandra-BKC-Sion corridor, though it does not pass through areas as dense as the corridor from Jacob Circle to Chembur via Wadala, is expected to be taken up in two phases. “We will take a call on the implementation depending upon what the report suggests,” Ramana added.

Source: Indian Express

http://www.expressindia.com/latest-news/monorail-corridor-ii-devp-body-for-new-financial-model/491292/

CIDCO asked Central Railway to stop work on the Belapur-Seawood-Uran railway line and opted for the Metro, along with a detour to the proposed Navi Mumbai airport.

As the cost of the railway project increased, the railways refused to pay its share. The railways had already spent Rs 50 crore and CIDCO Rs 75 crore on the project. Three road overbridges, 15 road underbridges, the Ulve Bridge, 4 major bridges and 73 minor bridges had been built.

“Leaving the project midway is a waste of public money and it was the CIDCO which had approached us to construct a line,” said a senior CR official. The CR, on its part, had shot several letters to the state government.CIDCO, meanwhile, has asked the DMRC to conduct a feasibility study on the Kharghar-Taloja corridor. The consultant is expected to submit its report by January 2010.

Source: TOI

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/Fresh-cloud-over-Navi-Mumbai-Metro/490929/

Source TOI

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Cities/Mumbai/Terror-threat-at-Andheri-Churchgate/articleshow/4760206.cms

Hey can you hear someone laughing out loudly. Those are the terrorists.

It seems that the only way we can deal with torror threats is to stop doing every thing. Here is a thought if we dont go out to work, then no one Bombay will need to travel and then terrorists can’t harm us, i know as absurd as it sounds. Thats the solution our securtiy agencies have been using for more then the last decade.

They don’t realise that by taking such absurd steps the terroirsts have already won. Did New York close down after 9/11. Were airplanes stopped from flying to Washinton? When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?

Bid Reference No. T/MUTP/MMC/EOI/2009
Sale of Bid Upto 10-Jul-09
Bid Closing 17-Jul-09

The Bandra-Worli sea link, which was opened with so much fanfare by none other than the Congress president Sonia Gandhi herself, has proved to be a dampener for the citizens in Mumbai. The way NCP chief Sharad Pawar has been trying to mollycoddle the Congress after the latter’s unexpected victory in the last Lok Sabha elections, speaks more about Pawar’s own existential issues than anything else. His idea of naming the bridge after Rajiv Gandhi smacked of the same kind of sycophancy that Congress revels in. The BJP’s suggestion of naming the bridge after freedom fighter Veer Savarkar (Savarkar used to stay in Dadar, close to the project) has met with a stunning silence as the Congress also realises the appropriateness of it.

The infrastructure development in the city has been all on stop-and-go mode for a long time. The project has been delayed at least by five years and the demand for roads and highways has exceeded the supply, or the projected new constructions. Other than the construction cost inflation which runs into hundreds of crores of rupees and the high toll charges that users have to pay, the bridge seems to have only added to the woes of this mega city that Congress wants to convert into another Singapore. The fate of a number of projects in Mumbai and elsewhere will face the fate of the Bandra-Worli sea link, simply because of the lack of foresight and handing over projects to private sector without encompassing a wholesome solution to urban infrastructure needs today.

In the suburban Mumbai, the situation on road traffic is going to get worse in places like Powai, where the MSRDC is building a six-lane-wide road after encroaching into the verdant IIT land. The problem is the same there too, at the Gandhi Nagar end as well as the L&T end, where the road gets narrow with no room for any widening. On the L&T end road-users get into traffic snarls every morning and evening. By widening the road partly the jams at both the ends will only get worse because of the bottlenecking.

The complete solution to growing traffic problems has to be met in two ways. One is that, road widening or building a bridge will not serve the purpose, as individual car-users are tempted to take their own cars on the road, adding to the existing chaos. On the other hand, as the roads are narrow at several patches the traffic jams can be prolonged and more frustrating than before. The second way of dealing with growing number of cars on the roads is to make the public transport comfortable and easy for everyone to travel, so that people do not have to take their individual cars to travel to work. As in Bengaluru, there has to be a new system where people have wall-to-work culture so that they save time on travelling and getting caught in traffic snarls, even while the environmental damage as well as the fuel cost burden get minimised. Some of the European cities have even imposed restrictions on movement of private cars inside city limits. The way Indian cities are growing, that solution does not look far-fetched.

Most cities in India have yet to comprehend the importance of public transport system. The metro work is yet to pick up pace in cities and most of them would overshoot their deadline as well as cost, which is very convenient to the developer. Many of the projects in various cities, even under the famed JNURM, have been faced with the same situation as the local authorities and the state governments have been playing their own political games, just as the Centre is not averse to earning its brownie points in such deals. Look at the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) newest problem in purchasing insurance protection for the Bandra-Worli sea link.

The terror pool, which is a virtual fund created by Indian insurers to meet any terror claims after 9/11, limits the total terror cover for the structure to Rs 500 crore against its construction cost of over Rs 1,600 crore. Also, a standard property insurance cover does not include design risks in the event of a cable snapping or a girder collapsing. MSRDC will also have to bear a high premium if it chooses to buy protection against pollution liability in the event of, say, a section of the bridge giving way. The corporation is to take a decision on covering these risks.

For public consumption Sonia Gandhi’s directive to Chief Minister of Maharashtra Ashok Chavan to complete the formalities to award the contract for Worli-Haji Ali link tract in about a week is well-intentioned. But the project delay starts after signing the construction contract with the developer. The state government then gets hand in glove with the construction company to delay the project and escalate costs. Even in case of the Bandra-Worli sea link, the government had faltered in payment which led to a dispute with Hindustan Construction Company, the builder of the sea link, and the delayed cost escalation is for all to see—from a mere Rs 350 crore to a whopping Rs 1,634 crore. That is approximately five times the original projection. The reason for foreign players in infrastructure building becoming suspicious of India is that pricing and costs are hugely unpredictable, there is political interference at every stage of the project, there is nepotism and favouritism in sub-contracting, and finally there is involvement of the underworld when it comes to clearing land for infrastructure projects, especially in places where there is minority community slums. Not a great deal on offer.

http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=299&page=3