New bridge to tackle bottleneck

Planned to boost the connectivity between Mumbai and Navi Mumbai, the Vashi creek bridge’s detailed project report (DPR) will be soon submitted to the state government for approval by Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC).

Confirming the move, Radheshyam Mopalwar, managing director, MSRDC, said, “We are in the process of preparing a DPR and we will submit the same to the state government.”

After going through several abrupt reversals since its inception in 2008, the cabinet sub committee on infrastructure finally approved it in December 2015. Initially the Public Works Department (PWD) was to construct the bridge, which was later assigned to the MSRDC that had also approached the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) for funds. But MMRDA denied the funds citing other big tickets infrastructure projects in the pipeline.

The project, which could not be carried forward due to lack of funds, is now pegged at Rs 800 crore. It has seen an escalation of more than 100 per cent since it was earlier pegged at Rs 300 crore

After getting approval for the DPR from the Board of the MSRDC headed by MSRDC minister Eknath Shinde, the DPR will be sent to the urban development department for the approval.

The new bridge will be a six-lane road parallel to the existing Vashi creek bridge, making it wider to compliment the width of Sion-Panvel highway.

The intersection of the 10 lanes Sion-Panvel highway and the existing three-lane Vashi creek bridge, creates a bottleneck, which the new project plans to remove.

Subsequently, the MSRDC is also planning to lease out its land parcels on the 95-km-long Mumbai-Pune Expressway for generating funds for its upcoming big-ticket infrastructure projects like the Mumbai-Nagpur Super Expressway.