Changing City: 5.6-km-long elevated road proposed to decongest Mumbai’s Dahisar Check Naka

Location and specification of the proposed plan:

The proposed road will originate near the Kandarpada Metro Station in Dahisar (west) and pass over the mangrove forests in Dahisar and salt pan land and extend till the Subhash Chandra Bose grounds near Uttan at Bhayander (west). The elevated bridge will be 45 metres wide and will be built on stilts. It will have 4×4 lanes, to allow smooth traffic flow. Civic officials said that emergency lanes for passing emergency vehicles like ambulance and fire-brigade engines will also be created on both sides.

The Dahisar-Mira Bhayander Link Road will have approximately 1.5 kilometres stretch coming under the BMC jurisdiction and 4 kilometres under MBMC.

Significance of the project:

The primary objective is to declutter the daily traffic movement at Dahisar Check Naka from where vehicles pass towards Vasai, Virar, Palghar, Gujarat and northwards to Delhi via Western Express Highway which further extends as National Highway 48.

The Check Naka is a bottleneck during peak hours.

The proposed elevated corridor is aimed to clear the bottleneck at the Check Naka and will prove to be a direct link connecting Mumbai with the satellite city.

How will it help Mumbaikars ?

This road will have the capacity of managing more than 80,000 vehicles per day and is expected to bring down the travel time between two cities to 10 minutes, which currently takes approximately 45 minutes from the Check Naka, during peak hours. Besides, the civic body has planned to create an elevated parking station between the stilt gaps.

Present status and construction period:

The BMC invited tenders for this project in October and is expecting to start the construction by early next year. The construction will take approximately 42 months.

Cost:

The cost of this project has been earmarked at Rs 3,186 crore.

Authority speaks:

“This flyover will bring down the daily traffic at Dahisar Naka by at least 40 per cent and will ease commuting. After the completion of both the Coastal Road and this project, travel time from south Mumbai to Mira Bhayander would take just an hour during peak time, as there will be no red light,” said an official.