After keeping the 9-km long Bandra-Versova sea link (BVSL) on paper for more than three years, the Maharastra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) plans to revive the project.
After keeping the 9-km long Bandra-Versova sea link (BVSL) on paper for more than three years, the Maharastra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) plans to revive the project.
The MSRDC had in the past also approached the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to merge the BVSL with the proposed 35.6-km coastal road, which will connect Nariman Point with Kandivali.
“We have had a few informal discussions with senior bureaucrats in the Mantralaya and they looked to be positive about the plan. The discussion will be taken forward once the ongoing assembly session is over,” said a senior MSRDC bureaucrat. He further said, “The officials at Mantralaya are concerned that once the coastal road is constructed people may not prefer using sea links and for that various studies will have to be carried out. But we can safely assume that the state government is keen on reviving the project.”
Subsequently, the BMC is also carrying out feasibility studies on whether the proposed coastal road can be extended up to Mira road from the initial plan of Kandivali.
Sea links in the state were planned during the rule of the previous Congress-NCP government. According to the plan, the Bandra-Worli sea ling, Bandra-Versova sea link, Nariman Point-Haji Ali sea link and the Worli-Haji Ali sea link were part of the western freeway project planned earlier.
The BVSL also got the required permissions from the Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) in 2015. “Subsequently, we have also prepared a detailed plan for the same. The project will get us the desired traffic as the traffic in any given city multiples with time and by the time the project is ready for use, the traffic will go up,” added the senior MSRDC bureaucrat.
The MSRDC has projects worth Rs 50,000 crore lined up and the only major hurdle for it will be to generate funds for taking up major infrastructure projects in the city.
The BVSL estimated cost is Rs 13,000 crore and is an extension towards northern end towards the Bandra-Worli sea link and for which the tenders were floated in 2014 on public private partnership (PPP) model. However, the project could not take off due to lack of political will and also because the infrastructure cabinet at that time was not convinced with the financial model MSRDC wanted to go ahead with.
