BMC: Coastal Road may get Rs 2,500 crore in civic budget

BMC plans to take up a major portion of the Coastal Road work in the upcoming financial year. File pic

With all the big-ticket projects of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) - Deonar waste-to-energy plant and Goregaon Mulund Link Road - set to find a mention in the civic budget, to be presented in the first week of February, senior civic officials said that the Coastal Road might get a sizeable allocation of Rs 2,500 crore. With all the legal hurdles out of their way, the civic body plans to take up a significant portion of the work on the Rs 13,000 crore project in the upcoming financial year. Last year, the BMC had allocated Rs 1,600 crore for the Coastal Road but none of it could be used till the SC vacated the stay on the project in December last year.

A senior civic official said that while the project would be completed in the next three years, the BMC was hoping to complete a majority of the piling work in the next eight to 10 months. "We have ordered specialised equipment. The piling rig machine can complete the work at a pace three times faster than that of other equipment. We have started the reclamation work at Haji Ali, Priyadarshini Park and Amarsons Garden," said the official. He added that more piling rig machines will be used in the coming months.

Projects like the Deonar waste-to-energy plant will also take off this year after a delay of almost four years. After several rounds of tendering, the solid waste management department has finally found a contractor for the Rs 600 crore-project. However, civic officials said that measures to be taken before the work starts will take a few months. "There will be a token allocation for the project since work at the site won't start immediately. We expect the work to start after monsoon," said a civic official.

The Coastal Road project was opposed by a number of communities, including fishermen, residents of Breach Candy, Peddar Road and Malabar Hill. Many had filed PILs in the Bombay High Court. However, the BMC managed to get relief from the SC last month.

Rs 13k-crore
Cost of Coastal Road project

Three
No. of years it will take to complete the project

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