Monorail phase 2 still stuck in limbo

Mumbai: The second phase of the monorail project, Wadala to Jacob Circle, is in a limbo as it has not yet received a safety certificate from the Railways. Trial runs were supposed to begin by October 10 but the deadline was missed. The CRS needs to conduct trial runs for around 3,000 km on the  stretch then issue a safety certificate. Signalling and communication failures were recorded during their testing process. The authority is expecting to start the monorail before year end.  

In the recent testing process, the monorail authorities had received a setback in the communication testing. Some components failed and now they have to replace these components. Till the replacement is not done, the MMRDA will not be able to complete the tests. Meanwhile, the authority also does not have the required number of rakes to conduct trial runs. At least four rakes are required.

For the first phase of monorail, the Chembur-Wadala corridor, the authority has 10 rakes out of which only four are operational while the rest are under maintenance. The contractor, Scomi Engineering, a Malaysian firm, was supposed to provide an additional five rakes to the authority, which it has not delivered yet.