Signal-free WEH: MMRDA floats tender for consultant

The work to construct Metro lines — civil work of Metro 7 (Dahisar-Andheri) and Metro 2A (D N Nagar-Dahisar) under process — along the WEH has only added to traffic pile ups during peak hours.

MMRDA officials said that at present, 16 km of WEH faces an acute problem of gridlocks, slowing down traffic by about 35 to 40 minutes. It takes about an hour-and-a-half to cover a distance of about 19.1 km from Dahisar and Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport.

“Our plan is to make WEH signal free to ease traffic on the highway,” said a senior official.

The tender floated by the MMRDA stated that the consultant is required to provide an urban design with traffic system layout, including access control on WEH along with signal-free junctions. While documents can be submitted for the same from Wednesday, the last date to do so is December 22.

The plan entails building an eight-lane flyover with four-lanes on each side. Of these four lanes, one on both the sides will allow motorists to enter and exit the corridor while the remaining three lanes on either sides will be signal-free from Bandra to Dahisar.

Sources said that for making WEH signal free, service roads have to be cleared and missing links on the highway bridged by constructing connecting flyovers.

At present, MMRDA has identified three spots — one at Kandivali, where construction of flyover may be difficult owing to litigation and two other spots, which have transmission towers that need to be relocated to make it a smooth thoroughfare.