Over the past year, Mumbaikars have come up against walls smack bang in the middle of their daily commute on arterial roads in the city. Where there were long stretches of roads, there are barricades announcing Metro corridors, worsening the traffic congestion.
Work on six Metro corridors in the city is being executed simultaneously, each at a different stage of completion. Barricading for elevated Metros takes up 9 metres of road space. Roads that have barricades include Jogeshwari Vikhroli Link Road (JVLR), Swami Vivekanand Road (SV Road), Lal Bahadur Shastri Marg (LBS Marg), Sion Panvel Highway and Eastern Express Highway (EEH).
Of width and alignment
The worst-affected seem to be SV Road and LBS Marg, which cut through densely populated suburbs in the West and East respectively. The overall width of the two is less than other arterial roads. Both are four-lane roads while the others have as many as eight lanes in certain sections.
LBS Marg has barricades running from Mulund to Ghatkopar for Metro 4. “It becomes very difficult for cars to get through even one kilometre without traffic jams on a regular evening. The traffic stretches from R City Mall to Thane,” said Rajesh Sharma, an Ola Cabs driver.
The corridor is also being built on the EEH from Ghatkopar to Wadala, where most of the stretch has been barricaded. While the areas around Siddharth Colony and Suman Nagar in Chembur have barricades on the side, Metro work is yet to begin in these areas. Motorists have a reprieve here since the road is considerably wide and is along the southbound stretch of the EEH.
Anik Depot is where the barricades pose a problem, because the alignment moves from the side of the road to the middle. “The entry to the bus depot is now barricaded for the Metro work. Earlier, buses could easily move on this road, but now they are unable to make their way and it takes hours for traffic to move on this road,” Mohammed Rahim, a taxi driver, said.
On the other side of the city, portions of Andheri Link Road and SV Road have barricades put up for Metro Line 2B. The effect of the barricades is acute near Santacruz station and on the stretch from Mithibai College to Juhu Circle. Gautam Rao, chairman, Guzdar Scheme Residents’ Trust in Santacruz, said the barricades are part and parcel of building an elevated Metro. “Fundamentally, the corridor should be underground. The way it is now, it will continue to create issues, for instance, with regard to fire safety, even after it is built,” he said.
The line also passes through crowded junctions of Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) and Kurla, where approximately 70% of the route has barricades. While work has started in a few places, at several spots in Kurla and Chembur, barricades have been positioned even before civil work has begun.
At Umarshi Bappa Chowk in Chembur, the barricades have resulted in increased traffic congestion. “Earlier, we could drive past smoothly. The traffic may be usual, but with the road having narrowed, it has become tougher, and leads to delays for office-going commuters,” Manoj Gondaliya, a local resident, said.
The stretch from Chembur Naka to Mankhurd is mostly barricaded along the middle of the road. The road leads to the Sion-Panvel toll naka and connects to the Eastern Freeway. “The Shivaji Circle was already a key congestion spot, but with the Metro work, traffic along the Sion-Panvel Highway has become hellish at peak hours,” said Tanya Mishra, who uses the road to go to Navi Mumbai twice a week to visit her relatives. “Even though I take cab, it takes a toll to be stuck in traffic for so long. On an average it takes 20 to 30 minutes more on Wednesdays and over 40 to 45 minutes on Fridays than it used to,” she said.
The 10.6-km-long JVLR has been nearly completely barricaded for Metro 6, which runs from Swami Samarth Nagar near Oshiwara to Vikhroli (East). The road is used by thousands of motorists every day as it is a key east-west connector of the city. Shantanu Ray, who drives from Kharghar to Andheri every day, said on an average, his travel time has increased by 20 to 25 minutes. “The section between Powai Garden and Jogeshwari is the worst as the road width reduces from six lanes to four lanes. The size of the road along the lake provides some relief,” he said.
‘Fragmented planning’
Constricting almost an entire city seems to be a bad idea for most. Powai resident and co-ordinator for L Ward at Action for Good Governance and Networking in India, Nutan Bhalla, said the government should have had a few Metro corridors up and running before starting work on other corridors. “I am not against Metros, but I firmly believe they should run underground. The barricades will worsen the overall traffic situation in Powai,” he said.
Urban researcher Hussain Indorewala, who teaches at Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute for Architecture and Environmental Studies, said planning of projects in the city has been fragmented and uncoordinated. “Different agencies are building different projects that end up competing rather than complementing each other. With elevated Metros they will effectively take one lane of the road. Planners could have easily used this lane for a dedicated bus corridor,” he said.
Roads like JVLR, EEH and WEH are wide enough to accommodate a bus lane, Mr. Indorewala said. “Why build eight-lane roads if you’re going to occupy one lane for construction in future?” he asked.
If there is another thing the city is dreading, it is the commute on these stretches during the monsoon. Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) officials, though, said they will deploy 75 engineers and 30 high-capacity dewatering pumps across all the corridors. They will also set up a disaster control room in the MMRDA office by the first week of June to monitor all elevated corridors.
Dilip Kawathkar, spokesperson for the MMRDA, said most barricades on Metro lines 2A and 7 have been removed. “the other corridors, we will ensure that no waterlogging occurs and there is smooth flow of traffic,” he said. All barricades along the Metro 2A and 7 will be removed before the year-end as the MMRDA aims to complete the civil construction of both the corridors, officials said.
The tentative completion date of the Metro 2B, 4 and 6 is December 2021, while Metro 3 is expected to be completed by 2022. Till then, Mumbaikars will have to chin up and bear the inconvenience.
