Construction work is likely to commence later this year for a vehicular underpass at one of the busiest traffic junctions in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) – Teen Haath Naka in Thane.
MMRDA floats request
The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has floated a Request For Proposal to appoint a consultant to appoint a project management consultant and get the project executed, based on the detailed project report it has. At a later stage, civil construction quotations are likely to be sought from the engineering firms.
Details of the project
The planned vehicular subway at the Teen Haath Naka will be from Kashish Park to Hariniwas Circle on LBS Road, below the existing Teen Hath Naka Junction on the Eastern Express Highway. Simultaneously, the slip road will also be improved for a better traffic flow.
At this juncture, the estimated cost for this 1.2 km long underpass is pegged at Rs 207.94 crore.
Teen Haath Naka and traffic
Teen Haath Naka is one of the busiest Junctions in Thane City. At this intersection, six roads merge, including the Eastern Express Highway and connect people with Thane Railway Station as well. Over the years, there has been an immense increase in traffic density leading to long waiting and snarls. Already there is an existing underpass at this junction to serve traffic movement on the Eastern Express Highway but vehicular movement on other roads is substantially high.
“As per a traffic survey done, the junction crosses 10,000 Passenger Car Units (PCUs) capacity for both morning and evening peak hours. Additionally, during the peak hours, the pedestrian crossing survey showed that there are over 3,000 people per hour moving across the junction. Hence, the need for grade separated traffic movement. It will reduce the traffic queue length, cut down on delay and decrease conflict points at the Teen Haath Naka Junction,” said an MMRDA official.
A PCU is a metric used in the transportation sector to assess traffic flow rate on any stretch of the road. For example, one car is considered as a single unit, motorcycle and bicycle are half a car unit, bus and truck are considered as 3 PCUs.
Other than these, construction is also underway for Mumbai Metro Line 4 between Wadala and Gaimukh.
Five phases in construction
Given the complex and busy intersection, the entire construction work has been planned to be executed staggering to five phases. Most likely the construction will commence after monsoon or civic elections, whenever they are scheduled and would take a minimum of two years for it to complete.
As there are multiple utility lines passing beneath such as high tension electric lines, telecom cables, water & sewer pipelines, and most importantly a major underground BMC water pipeline supplying potable water to Mumbai. In case there is a delay in shifting these, it will have a cascading effect on the project’s timeline as well.
