14 August,2016 11:36 AM IST | | Ranjeet Jadhav
While the state government is yet to take a final call on scrapping the toll collection at the five toll collections point to Mumbai and the Bandra Worli Sea Link (BWSL), the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) will be soon appointing an agency for doing traffic survey using video graphing technique to get d exact data of the vehicles traveling through the above two mentioned points
While the state government is yet to take a final call on scrapping the toll collection at the five toll collections point to Mumbai and the Bandra Worli Sea Link (BWSL), the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) will be soon appointing an agency for doing traffic survey using video graphing technique to get d exact data of the vehicles traveling through the above two mentioned points.
The date will be further shared with the state government so that decision regarding scrapping of toll might be taken.
"We have invited tenders for the appointment of an agency that will be carrying out a continuous 24-hours videographing traffic count survey of the vehicles passing through five entry point to Mumbai and BWSL for a period of one week. The data that we will be generating using he same will give us information about the vehicles that pass through each of the two places and also the rough estimate of the revenue generated in the way of toll collection." Said a MSDC official
It should be noted that August 16 will be the last date for submission of the bids and on August 18 the bids will be opened where it will be decided about the agency that will do the traffic survey.
As a part of the survey, the agency will monitor and will also identify the vehicles which pass the toll plaza on a frequent basis and the survey of the vehicles that are exempted from paying the toll will also be used. In each of the toll plaza lanes, there will be two cameras that will record the vehicle along with its number plate. Based on the mentoring exercise, the agency that is doing the survey will have to provide MSRDC with the hour wise data of the vehicles passing through each of the toll plazas.
It should be noted that in the month of April 2014, the Chief Minster had said that the committee set up under Additional Chief Secretary Anand Kulkarni to look into the toll issue related to the five entry point to Mumbai and Mumbai Pune Expressway was supposed to submit its report by July 31, 2015.
The committee had submitted the half report by July 31 last year and was given an extension of another three months (October 31) to submit the report.
It should be noted that the Maharashtra Government had appointed a panel which was headed by the PWD secretary to do detailed study on "financial and legal viability" of shutting down the toll collection plazas at the Mumbai Pune Expressway and also for the five entry points to Mumbai.
