Rly officials have finalised plans for two elevated roads, one of which will be linked to western highway.
At least one of the city’s many traffic nightmares now has an end in sight. Western Railway (WR) has finalised plans for building two elevated roads to lift the chaotic traffic around Bandra Terminus, improving accessibility to a station that sees nearly 50 long-haul trains - and long queues of honking vehicles - every day.
According to plans Mumbai Mirror has accessed, one of these elevated roads will provide direct connectivity to the Western Express Highway: running from north of the terminus, passing through WR colony and curving around Nirmal Nagar police station and Cardinal Gracias School before landing on a service road on the highway’s western side.
Its length has been fixed at 900 metres, and the width may vary from 10 metres to 17 metres depending on the land available for constructing the pillars.
The other elevated road will come up east of Bandra suburban station. This stretch, which will be 750 metres long and 7.5 metres wide, will go all the way to the entrance of the terminus.
Railway officials are yet to calculate the total cost of the project.
The existing approach and exit roads are severely congested, and people who drive to or from the terminus face ridiculous delays. With rail and passenger traffic at the station growing rapidly, it has become imperative to ease snarl-ups, say WR officials.
‘Better access need of the hour’
“The accessibility to Bandra terminus needs to be improved as its train and passenger traffic is growing rapidly. In fact, some popular trains to Gujarat and Rajasthan originate from this station,” said a senior WR official. “It’s proximity to the western highway and the business district of Bandra Kurla Complex also makes it an important junction.”
The six-platform terminal, which was built to ease the load of Mumbai Central terminus, sees arrivals and departures of 46 long-distance trains and 20,000 passengers every day. It helps WR pull in income of Rs 65.7 crore. Mumbai Cen-tral can accommodate trains with 18 coaches, while the Bandra terminal can cater to 24-car trains.
For WR, a few bumps ahead
WR will face some obstacles for building the elevated road with highway connectivity. There are some patches of land on the planned route, near the Nirmal Nagar police station, that are not owned by the railway. WR general manager Mahesh Kumar has written to the city administration to acquire these patches.
“If we don’t get the land, we will change the route slightly; the road will run along the southern side of ONGC quarters instead of the police station,” said another official.
The easy part
He, however, added that there were currently some encroachments on the alternative route. Constructing the second elevated stretch will be easier, as it has been planned entirely on railway land.
“This road will come up east of the suburban station, and will serve as an approach to the terminus. The existing station road will be used by outbound traffic,” the WR official. “Easing traffic congestion in this manner is part of our ‘Uniflow’ strategy.”
