While the focus of the metro rail authorities is in completing the 30-km Nagole-Ameerpet-Miyapur stretch by this month-end to make it ready for the scheduled inauguration, there has been another remarkable engineering work which has been completed recently as part of the project.
Overhead metro rail viaduct of Corridor Two (Jubilee Bus Station to Mahatma Gandhi Bus Station/Falaknuma) crossing over the Corridor Three (Nagole to Hi-Tec City/Raidurg) and then having to be built over Hari Hara Kala Bhavan also in a single leap with no pillar beneath was yet another work reflecting the engineering skill and expertise involved in the project.
Metro rail officials say this aspect of construction was no less complex when compared to the crossing the overhead viaduct over the existing railway overbridges and it called for planning of high precision and timing considering the round the clock traffic movement down below on the S.P. Road. in Secunderabad.
Even the temporary structures which are built from the road on to the viaduct under construction had to be carefully designed and put in place to create sufficient space for the traffic to move about without much restriction. “We also had to manoeuvre the heavy cranes and equipment”, explains L&T Metro Rail Hyderabad (L&TMRH) project director M.P. Naidu.
Why the L&TMRH had to build the crossover falling on Corridor Two even though the effort was mostly on completing the Nagole-Ameerpet-Miyapur route combining parts of Corridor Three and Corridor One (Miyapur to L.B.Nagar) is because once the electrification of the 30-km route is completed, workers cannot operate on the corridor passing above connecting to the Parade Grounds interchange station, says HMR MD N.V.S. Reddy.
Hence, the heights of the piers (pillars) and the crossover span over the flyover and metro rail viaduct too have increased considerably. For instance, if Corridor III line is 36 ft from ground, Corridor II line above is 66 ft high with the main span stretching to 180 ft to cross both the elevated structures for it to land on the Parade Ground station. Its height at flyover crossing is 31 ft. Special high tension bearings were used for fastening the segments, he avers. “In fact, we got LEA Associates to study 110 junctions where the metro rail project crosses and planned the viaduct keeping in mind the traffic needs for the next 40-50 years,” says Mr. Reddy. More than 200 highly skilled workers worked day and night to get this work done even as the Oliphenta steel bridge was being put into place.
