‘Planning to sell our land to meet expenditure’: MMRDA Additional Commissioner

For the past few years, many projects like the over 10 Metro lines, infrastructure projects like the Mumbai Trans-Harbour Link (MTHL), the International Financial Service Centre (IFSC) and growth centres in Kalyan have increased our expenditure. The estimated cost of every project is a minimum Rs 5,000 crore. To meet the expenditure, we are working on sale of land banks. Areas where the MMRDA is the special planning authority, it is raising funds by leasing land. The MMRDA is also getting help from the state and central government in addition to investments from international financial institutions.

How are you planning to use land banks? Any plans of selling MMRDA land?

The past few years, the real estate sector in the city had not been doing so well. Due to the crunch in the real estate market, our land parcels were not getting good value, so we had halted the process of selling them. However, in the past few months, the situation has improved, so we plan to sell some portions of land in prime locations. We have some parcels of land in the Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) G Block, which we plan to sell. These land parcels have a FSI of four, making it lucrative for developers.

What are the plans to decongest road traffic at BKC?

We are planning to make several roads one-way. Recently, under directions of the MMRDA commissioner, we have prepared a plan in which vehicles coming from outside the BKC will exit directly and don’t have to enter the business hub.

What about the Integrated Ticket System (ITS)? By when will the city have the ITS?

The ITS will be launched by 2020. Earlier, there were some issues as to what system was to be followed but majority of those issues have been ironed out. Monorail, Metro One, Metro 2A, Metro 7 (Dahisar-Andheri) and BEST buses will be the first to have the ITS. In the second phase, we will include the railways and other modes of transport under the ITS.

When will Mumbai Monorail phase-2 start?

We are targeting mid-March to begin Monorail phase 2 (Chembur-Jacob circle). Currently, however, we have a shortage of rakes. Now, we have only three rakes in working condition on which we are already running Monorail phase-1 (Wadala to Chembur). We are working to refit three more rakes. We have asked companies for spare parts and also floated tenders for that.

What is the status of the MTHL corridor? Are you facing any difficulties as the alignment is close to oil pipelines?

Work on the MTHL corridor is going on at a good pace. We have almost a 740-metre temporary sea bridge. Currently, we are working on the alignment of the corridor as there are oil pipelines inside the water. We have decided to maintain a 10-metre distance from the pipelines.