The tendering process for the much-awaited metro line from Silk Board to Kempegowda International Airport — the deadline for which is 2023 — is finally taking shape. Work on the line will be divided into eight segments, tenders for which are likely to floated by October-end or early November.
The Silk Board to K.R. Puram line (Phase II A) will be implemented in three packages while the K.R. Puram to KIA line (Phase II B) will be taken up in five packages, said officials.
Ajay Seth, Managing Director, Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL), said, “It is a 56-km-long line. We have submitted the tender documents to the Asian Development Bank and are awaiting their nod. We are not going to float the tenders at one go, but once in three months in two to three packages.”
Past efforts to get the project off the ground have not met with much success. In February 2018, the BMRCL had floated tenders for the 17-km stretch from Silk Board to K.R. Puram. Several bids were received, but the tenders were cancelled in December 2018. Reasons cited by BMRCL were low bids by the crisis-hit IL&FS, failure to raise funds to implement the project and delay in land acquisition.
The delay in executing the project on the Outer Ring Road (Silk Board to K.R. Puram) has irked lakhs of citizens who work in the IT corridor who pointed out that traffic snarls and long commutes have become the norm.
BMRCL officials said that, for the ORR line, 85 properties covering over 40,000 sq.m. of land have been identified. “We are in the process of paying compensation to the owners, which we hope to complete by the end of October,” said a BMRCL official.
However, land acquisition for Phase II B, from K.R. Puram to KIA, is far from complete. Barring the land required for Hebbal metro station, the government has only issued a preliminary notification for the other properties on the stretch.
The BMRCL is getting 1.05 lakh sq.m. of land from Hebbal to the trumpet interchange on NH 44 from the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI).
Box 1
No road-cum-metro flyover
To ease the traffic congestion on Old Madras Road, the BMRCL had proposed to build a road-cum-metro flyover between K.R. Puram station and Kasturinagar.
It has now decided to drop the plan saying it is not feasible. Instead, it is planning to widen existing roads on the stretch.
As per the plan, the BMRCL is building a line from Baiyappanahalli to Whitefield and another from K.R. Puram to KIA on a stretch of Old Madras Road.
Box 2
UDF from air passengers
The Airports Economic Regulatory Authority of India (AERA) had taken a decision that BIAL can collect User Development Fee (UDF) from air passengers only after the metro line to the airport is commissioned.
Ajay Seth, Managing Director, BMRCL, said, “We will have an arrangement with BIAL. We will build the metro stations. After the line is commissioned, BIAL will collect the User Development Fee fixed by the AERA, and the same will get transferred to the BMRCL.”
As per the plan, two metro stations will come up inside the airport campus providing access to Terminal 1 and Terminal 2.
