mid-day Exclusive: The 17 'rivers' paving a parallel city under Mumbai

The tunnel boring machine laid down at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus has now reached Girgaum

Around eight storeys beneath your feet, the Metro III tunnel boring machines are whirring quietly, building a parallel city of underground tunnels. As of now, 10.72 km of tunnels are ready. The machines lowered at at CSMT have reached Girgaum, and the one at Naya Nagar has now reached Dadar, about 500 metres from Shiv Sena Bhavan.

Some 80 feet underground, there are 17 tunnel boring machines (TBM) - named after rivers in Maharashtra - furiously digging the 33.5-km Metro network. The Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ corridor will connect six business districts, the domestic and international airports, and have five interchange points for suburban railways and one each for the Monorail and Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar Metro. mid-day goes underground to find how far the machines have reached.

Graphic/Ravi Jadhav

Cuffe Parade-CSMT
Stations: 4 (Cuffe Parade, Vidhan Bhavan, Churchgate, Hutatma Chowk)
TBM: 2 (Surya 1 and 2)
Total length of tunnel: 5.88 km
Tunnel completed: 41 m
Total muck volume 10.5L m3
Muck generated and disposed: 2.5 lakh m3
Disposal sites: Kalwar and Ulwe

CSMT-Mumbai Central
Stations: 4 (CST Metro, Kalabadevi, Girgaum, Grant Road)
No. of TBM: 2 (Vaitarna 1 and 2)
Total length of tunnel: 7.64 km
Tunnel completed: 1.74 km
Total muck volume: 6.86 lakh m3
Muck generated and disposed: 2.27 lakh m3
Disposal sites: Mhape MIDC and Ambernath

Sahar-Seepz
Stations: 3 (Marol Naka, MIDC and SEEPZ)
No. of TBM: 3 (Wainganga 1, 2 and 3)
Total length of tunnel: 7.07 km
Tunnel completed: 1.26 km
Total muck volume: 11 lakh m3
Muck generated and disposed: 2.35 lakh m3
Disposal sites: Talawali-Pise

Santacruz-Sahar
Stations: 3 (Domestic Airport, Sahar Road, International Airport)
No. of TBM: 1 (Tapi)
Total length of tunnel: 6.94 km
Tunnel competed till date: 0
Total muck volume: 13.6 lakh m3
Muck generated and disposed: 7.01 lakh m3
Disposal sites: Waliv and Daniv

Dharavi-Santacruz
Stations: 4 (Dharavi, BKC, Vidyanagari, Santacruz)
No. of TBM: 4 (Godavari 1, 2, 3 and 4)
Total length of tunnel: 7.99 km
Tunnel completed: 1.85 km
Total muck volume: 10.7 lakh m3
Muck generated and disposed: 1.87 lakh m3
Disposal sites: Waliv and Daniv

Mumbai Central-Worli
Stations: 4 (Central Metro, Mahalaxmi, Science Museum, Worli)
No. of TBM: 2 (Tansa 1 and 2)
Total length of tunnel: 7.4 km
Tunnel completed: 2m
Total muck volume: 21 lakh m3
Muck generated and disposed: 91,000 m3
Disposal sites: Dapode and Bhiwandi

Worli-Dharavi
Stations: 3 (Siddhivi-nayak, Dadar, Sitaladevi)
No. of TBM: 3 (Krishna 1, 2 and 3)
Total length of tunnel: 10.95 km
Tunnel completed: 3.46 km
Total muck volume: 9.29 lakh m3
Muck generated and disposed: 2.47 lakh m3
Disposal sites: Dapode and Waliv

Metro 3 in numbers

• 80ft Depth of tunnels
• 17 No. of tunnel boring machines
• 10.72 Tunnel length (in km) that is ready so far
• 33.5 Length (in km) of corridor
• 27 No. of stations
• 19 l Total muck (in cubic metres) disposed of so far

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