CMO directs BMC to complete land acquisition for Phase 2 of coastal road within 15 days

“Many of these lands belong to the fisheries department and revenue department. The proposal for transferring the lands have already been raised with the respective departments. On Friday’s meeting it was decided that the ownership of these lands should be transferred to the BMC in the next 15 days for the coastal road project and we will be following up with respective departments,” an official told the Indian Express.

“The parcels mostly include mangrove patches and marshy lands. There will be no reclamation of the sea unlike the first phase of the project,” the official said.

The civic officials maintained that the process of changing the reservation of these lands have already been initiated.

In Mumbai, vacant land parcels are reserved under the BMC’s Development Plan (2034) model. These reservations are made so that the land parcels are earmarked for utilising them for public amenities in the future. In case the said land parcel falls in the alignment of any infrastructure or government project, their reservations are being changed in order to assimilate them for the said project.

As part of this project, nearly 60 plots between Goregaon and Dahisar will undergo change of reservation. It was also decided in the meeting that the periphery around the coastal road will be transformed into a modern commercial hub on the lines of the present day Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC). The CMO also stated that adequate compensatory plantation of the mangroves should also need to be carried out simultaneously as the construction of the project begins.

“We have acquired the coastal clearances and Union ministry’s clearance for this project. After the forest permissions come through, we will approach the Bombay High Court seeking permission to cut mangroves,” the official said.

The proposed second phase of the coastal road has been divided into six different packages. Package A will cover 4.5 km between Versova and Bangur Nagar (Goregaon), Package B will cover 1.66 km between Bangur Nagar and Mindspace (Malad). The packages C and D will include twin tunnels–3.9 km long–connecting Mindspace at Malad with Charkop in Kandivali.

Package E will be 3.78 km, connecting Charkop with Gorai and the final Package F will be 3.69 km which will connect Gorai with Dahisar. From Dahisar, the civic authorities are constructing another 5.6 km elevated corridor that will extend till Bhayander at Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR).

The overall project will be 25 km long and the total cost of these two projects have been pegged at Rs 20,000 crore. The BMC last year had secured environmental clearances for going ahead with the project and the on-groundwork started this year.

The phase two of the coastal road will be a series of underground tunnels, cable-stayed bridge and vehicular interchanges that will improve north-south connectivity. The coastal road will also provide connectivity with the Goregaon Mulund Link Road (GMLR), an east-west connector that is also being constructed by the Mumbai civic body.