Mumbai 30 August : In a major step The the Chief Minister Eknath Shinde and Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis launched the first trial runs of the city’s first subterranean Mumbai Metro 3 line, on Tuesday.The construction work on the 33.50 km long Metro 3 corridor started in 2016 and the first phase is expected to be finished by the end of 2023.
Shinde, Fadnavis and Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Ltd (MMRCL) officials have lowered the green flag for the test run in Sariputnagar in Aarey Colony temporary car-shed within the tunnel for 3 kms until the Marol Naka Station.
Shinde spoke at the event.Shinde stated that nothing can stop the development of Mumbai as well as Maharashtra following the election of the new government that took over on June 30, 2022.
Fadnavis stated that resistance to the Metro car shed in Aarey Colony was more politically motivated than environmental and also criticised the prior Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) Shiv Sena-Nationalist Congress government of the Congress Party for delaying the project that was so desperately needed.
MMRCL officials have informed that the tests of the metro rakes in the next three-six month period will include various parameters such as speed emergency brakes, oscillation in the tunnel, which is the first time for Mumbai.
Metro 3 line Metro 3 line will connect Colaba in south Mumbai to SEEPZ in north-west through Bandra with the initial phase expected to start operating by December.2023 and the following phase to be operational by June 2024, according to officials.
According to the original plans the line was planned to be completed in December 2021, however, the line was delayed because of the car-shed row that was extending into the Aarey Colony.The MVA government had rebuffed the plan in November of this year, to move the car-shed to an alternative location in Kanjurmarg.
When it came to power just two months ago, the Shinde Fadnavis government increased the MVA’s relocation and restored the car-shed’s site in Kanjurmarg and returned it to Aarey Forest, attracting howls of protests from the Sena NCP-Congress and environmentalists.
The delays have resulted in an increase in costs from initial estimates of around Rs 23,000-crore to approximately Rs 37,000-crore.
the entire project is scheduled to be completed only in the middle of 2025.
The current state of the project is that nearly 99 percent of tunnel digging work are completed, as well as 84 of the civil construction, which gives an overall project completion of about 70 per cent.
The 33.50 kilometers Metro 3 will have 27 stations on the way, including 26 underground and one that is at ground-level, with a portion of the line running beneath the Mahim Creek and the Mithi River.
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