Metro car depot at Aarey Colony likelier

The Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation (MMRC) has decided to go ahead with the plan to construct a car depot at Aarey Colony, instead of the Kanjurmarg plot, for the Colaba-Bandra-Seepz Metro-3 corridor. The decision was taken in a board meeting of the MMRC, which is headed by Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) commissioner U.P.S. Madan.

The ball in now in the state government’s court as it must decide whether to approve the decision to construct the depot or not, said sources from the MMRC. The plan to construct the depot at Aarey Colony is being opposed from activists and politicians, who have said that it would harm the environment and the wildlife in Aarey Colony.

The meeting was conducted on Saturday, which was attended by senior bureaucrats from the state and Central government. “Various options for the car depot were discussed like Kanjurmarg and Aarey Colony. To avoid delays, as the proposed Kanjurmarg depot is under litigation, we have decided to go ahead with 20-hectare plot at Aarey Colony. We have not ruled out the Kanjurmarg option, we are not going to wait for it,” said sources in MMRC.

Sources said the initial plan was to construct a double-decker car depot, and the plan has been tweaked to having only an on surface car depot at the Aarey Colony plot.

The MMRC also has plans to tweak the civil designs of the Metro-3 stations and subways. “The costs of the overall project could be decreased if we go ahead with tweaking the civil designs of the project,” said an MMRC official.

The Union ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) has declared areas in a four-kilometre radius of Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) as eco-sensitive zones. However, MMRC has claimed that this does not restrict the construction in Aarey Colony and the car depot is not within any eco-sensitive area.

However, environmentalists have planned protests. “We will protest against the whole idea and will also inform the National Green Tribunal that the MMRC is making mischief when the matter is being already challenged in the NGT,” said D. Stalin, member, Aarey Conservation Group.