The first flyover of the Goregaon Mulund Link Road (GMLR) will become operational in May next year, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation said on Friday. The GMLR is a 12.2-km long high-speed corridor comprising underground tunnels, bridges and traffic interchanges being constructed by the BMC. Once completed, the arterial road will connect the Goregaon area in the western suburbs with Mulund in the eastern suburbs. The project has been divided into four phases. The proposed flyover will originate near the Dindoshi court and will end at Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) from where motorists will be able to enter the twin tunnels directly. These tunnels will extend further eastwards up to 6-km from underneath the SGNP and exit at Mulund. The boring work of the tunnels are expected to begin early next year while the assembling of the Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) is at present underway at the venue. "The flyover will have 31 pillars, of which 27 have been erected. The work of erecting the remaining four pillars is currently underway. The west-bound arm of the flyover will be completed by January 2026 and we have set an April 2026 target to complete the east bound arm of the flyover. Following which post-construction or ancillary works will be taken up and we aim to open the flyover by May 2026," an official said. The flyover will be 1.2-km long and will mark the end of the first phase of the project. The flyover will have six vehicular lanes along with an elevated rotary or circular intersection that is being constructed on a raised platform. Further, the authorities have also said that walkways will be constructed on two sides of the bridge along with deck slabs. The officials added that once the bridge is ready, it will provide motorists direct access between Dindoshi and SGNP and once the tunnels are ready, vehicles will get direct access to the tunnel from the bridge. Being built at Rs 14,000 crore, the 12-km-long GMLR will traverse towards the east from the Western Express Highway (WEH) and extend till Mulund in the eastern suburbs. At present, there’s no direct connectivity between these two parts of the city and travel time during peak hours ranges from 75 to 90 minutes. After the GMLR is ready, travel time between these two points will come down to 25 minutes. The deadline for the completion of twin tunnels has been set for 2028, while the project is set to become entirely operational by 2029 onwards.
