Barfiwala Flyover won’t be demolished for Gokhale Bridge alignment works: BMC

The civic officials also maintained that the work of aligning the two bridges will be taken up in monsoon, when usually all the civil and infrastructure works are stalled for a four-month period.

This is done to ensure that the portion of the bridge, where vehicular movement has been started, could be aligned with the Barfiwala flyover by the end of 2024, officials said.

“The process of aligning the two structures will mainly involve a process of lifting the span of the existing Barfiwala Flyover and recasting them so that the carriageways of the two bridges are aligned in a way. This process will not require demolition and construction works. Therefore, it could be executed very smoothly even during monsoon,” said a senior official.

The BMC authorities have already written a letter to the Election Commission of India (ECI’s) office seeking approval for the same.

Earlier, in a report submitted to BMC, the Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute (VJTI) had recommended that since the Barfiwala Flyover is in a good condition, there is no requirement of demolishing it entirely.

Following this, the civic authorities approached IIT-Bombay seeking a second technical opinion which came on Wednesday afternoon.

“According to a technical report submitted by VJTI, this process would take around 90 days therefore, we are targeting to align at least the northern side of the two arms by the end of this year,” the official added.

The Barfiwala Flyover was constructed in 2008 and would originate from Juhu and connect with the north-south arms of the old Gokhale Bridge, which has been in existence since 1960.

The latter was demolished in 2022 and a new bridge was constructed in its place, which was opened for vehicular movement on February, 26 this year.

Since this bridge passes above the railway tracks, as per the guidelines of railways, the BMC constructed the new Gokhale Bridge at an elevated height of six meters, resulting in misalignment of its arms with the Barfiwala Flyover.