The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has decided to introduce mono pile technology, for the first time in the country, in the under-construction Coastal Road that connects south Mumbai to western suburbs.
Generally, any bridge on a sea or river is built using group pile technology. But in mono pile technology, one single pile is used instead of four piles for supporting one pillar.
“This will save us on the space to construct the pillars. The number of piles has come down to 176 from 704 due to the introduction of this new technology. It is also environment friendly,” Suprabha Marathe, chief engineer of the coastal road project, said.
The BMC has initiated the pioneering project of building three such pillars using mono pile technology. Construction of test piles will be completed by July after which they will be subjected to pressure of a few tonnes horizontally as well as vertically to test their load-taking capacity.
Each pile will come in three different diameters as per the requirement which are 2.5 metre, 3 metre and 3.5 metre. “We have invited experts from different countries who have experience in this technology since this is being built for the first time in India. The machinery too has been imported from Europe,” the official said.
