The Mumbai Monorail project which was staring at a delay owing to obtaining Right of Way (ROW) in certain congested localities would now be redesigned marginally to avoid major land acquisitions processes. The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), the nodal agency for the project, has to obtain ROW at Bhoiwada, Antop Hill, Ambedkar Nagar and Mint Colony areas.

According to Ratnakar Gaikwad, Metropolitan Commissioner, the alignment of monorail at Bhoiwada in Parel would be reworked to avoid the congested locality. “The ROW at Bhoiwada is an issue as it a congested area. We’d redesign it to go near KEM Hospital and Haffkine Institute to Currey Road station,” Gaikwad told Newsline.

Earlier, MMRDA had to acquire a building to give way to the Monorail, which would have delayed the project considerably. With the change in alignment, the MMRDA will not have to convince the project-affected people to shift thus avoiding the impending legal procedures if any Project Affected Person (PAP) goes to court. In other areas like Antop Hill, Ambedkar Nagar, etc it still has to acquire small structures. The agency not only has to acquire the land, but also rehabilitate the Project Affected People (PAP).

The 20-km Monorail corridor, the first one in the country, is being constructed by Larsen & Toubro and Scomi. The first link of the Monorail from Chembur to Wadala is expected to complete in November 2010 and the second link (Wadala to Jacob Circle) in April 2011.

Meanwhile, Gaikwad is confident that there would be no delay in the completion of the project despite R&R and ROW issues. “I’m quite confident that it’ll be completed in time. And I’m also hopeful that the test runs on a 2 km stretch would happen by January 26,” said Gaikwad. Interestingly, the contract for the Monorail has a clause of penalising the contractor if it doesn’t abide by the deadline - the consortium would have to pay up a penalty of Rs 50 lakh for every day after the deadline.