Gokhale bridge. (Express photo by Santosh Parab)Four days after it shut down Gokhale Bridge for pedestrian and vehicular movement, the BMC is no way close to finding out how it should go ahead with demolishing the structure even as common Mumbaikars face the brunt of an extremely chaotic traffic situation.
At present, the BMC and the Western Railway (WR) are yet to take a decision on who will demolish the bridge.
P Velrasu, additional municipal commissioner (Projects), told The Indian Express on Thursday that BMC and Railways officials will meet on Friday. He added that the delay in starting demolition work was due to the fact the Railways has always demolished bridges that run above rail tracks and the BMC has no prior experience in demolishing such bridges.
“The tenders for reconstructing the bridge will be floated in the next 10 days. Tomorrow (November 11) we have scheduled a meeting with the Railways, following which, a final decision on who will demolish the bridge will be taken. The BMC has never undertaken any demolition activity over railway lines. It is more efficient if the Railways demolished the bridge,” Velrasu said.
On Wednesday, Velrasu had told The Indian Express, “We are aiming to open two lanes of the reconstructed bridge by May 2023 for traffic movement, following which, the remaining two lanes will be started by September next year. This is the deadline that we have set and if the Railways completes the demolition of the bridge in the next one month and hands it over to us for reconstruction, we may be able to finish the project a bit earlier as well.”
The Gokhale bridge is a key link in the western suburbs, connecting Andheri East and West. On November 1, the BMC had written to the Mumbai Police’s traffic department, asking it to close the bridge since a recent audit had revealed that the existing structure had corroded and degraded. Following this, the bridge was shut from November 7.
Meanwhile, in another letter to the Railways on November 7, the BMC had urged it to expedite the demolition of the bridge since a major part of it runs over railway tracks and overhead electric cables.
On November 8, the Railways wrote back to the BMC, stating that it is the civic body’s responsibility to demolish the bridge, as it was decided in a June 2021 meeting that construction and demolition, including that of the railway portion, will be carried out by BMC, while the Railways will provide necessary assistance.
Now, with BMC and WR passing the buck, demolition work is yet to begin.
Residents of Andheri said that though alternate routes have been chalked out, they are not bringing any relief since these routes are unable to handle the huge volume of traffic that Gokhale Bridge catered to. “If the agencies had a joint meeting regarding the demolition of the bridge in 2021, why was there a further delay of one more year to shut down the bridge? The Railways has its specialty on coordinating train-timings and mega-blocks, while BMC has the technology. The agencies are supposed to work together,” said Dhaval Shah, a local resident and co-founder of Lokhandwala Oshiwara Citizen’s Association.