3rd cave-in at Peddar Road in 3 months

It appears that Peddar Road is jinxed, as yet another cave-in incident occurred near Gamadia Junction yesterday afternoon. It was the third such incident in the last three months.

Hole in the road: The site near Gamadia Junction where the road caved in yesterday afternoon. Pic/Bipin Kokate

The cave-in left a five-foot-deep and 10-foot-wide crater right in the middle of the road. Soon after the incident, the civic body initiated repair work to fill the crater and the traffic was diverted to Kemps Corner and Gamadia Street.

Reasons cited for the incident was the leaking 80-year-old underground dhapa-drain, a part of the sewage line, which runs right below the divider.

The solution
BMC officials said that until the Peddar Road flyover was constructed, the problem of road cave-ins would persist.

"Until the work on flyover commences, we cannot replace the underground drainage line," said BMC Director (Engineering) Laxman Vhatkar.

The civic body wants to close the old drain and lay new pipelines on either side of the road, so that pillars can be placed at the centre of the road.

Flyover history
The MSRDC had planned to construct a 4.3-km-long flyover - connecting Haji Ali Junction to Girgaum Chowpatty, and passing via
arterial Peddar Road.

The project was proposed more than a decade ago. But it is yet to see light of the day as it has been facing myriad problems, including opposition from the locals.

Previous cave ins
September 17: A portion
of the road caved in near
the key stretch on Jaslok Hospital during morning peak hours, leading to ugly traffic snarls

July 12: A 4-ft portion of the same road had caved in at the Gamadia junction. Even then, a slab of an old stormwater drain had collapsedu00a0