Mumbai: It will take another six months for the Borivali to Thane underground tunnel work to start, as the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) is yet to obtain a nod from the National Wildlife Board for conducting boring operations in Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP).
“In order to bore in the forest land, we need clearance from the National Wildlife Board. It seems like the board will take another six months for the approval,” said a senior MSRDC official.
“In August 2016, we had marked the borehole location in the village maps and the plan was submitted to the SGNP officials, but they had raised certain objections on the plan,” said the official.
The project has been on the receiving end of flak in the past from environmentalists, who claimed that the project would disturb the biodiversity in SGNP, as tunnelling work would make a lot of noise. For the tunnelling process, the authority will have to use Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM), which is currently being used for the work of Metro-3 (Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ).
The six-lane tunnel proposed in 2015 will connect Tikuji-ni-Wadi in Thane to Western Express Highway (WEH) at Borivali.
It has been two years, since the state government approved the project, however till now, no civil work has commenced due to lack of forest clearance. The project costs '1,500 crore and entails a 11km long tunnel which will pass under SGNP and is expected to cut the travel time between Mumbai and Thane by 20 minutes.
It will take another six months for the Borivali to Thane underground tunnel work to start, as the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) is yet to obtain a nod from the National Wildlife Board for conducting boring operations in Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP).
“In order to bore in the forest land, we need clearance from the National Wildlife Board. It seems like the board will take another six months for the approval,” said a senior MSRDC official. “In August 2016, we had marked the borehole location in the village maps and the plan was submitted to the SGNP officials, but they had raised certain objections on the plan,” said the official.
The project has been on the receiving end of flak in the past from environmentalists, who claimed that the project would disturb the biodiversity in SGNP, as tunnelling work would make a lot of noise. For the tunnelling process, the authority will have to use Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM), which is currently being used for the work of Metro-3 (Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ). The six-lane tunnel proposed in 2015 will connect Tikuji-ni-Wadi in Thane to Western Express Highway (WEH) at Borivali.
It has been two years, since the state government approved the project, however till now, no civil work has commenced due to lack of forest clearance. The project costs '1,500 crore and entails a 11km long tunnel which will pass under SGNP and is expected to cut the travel time between Mumbai and Thane by 20 minutes.
