Government nod to extension of Metro line up to Udyog Vihar with 25 new stations

The Haryana government on Monday approved the construction of a Metro corridor that will begin where Delhi Metro Rail Corporation’s (DMRC) Yellow Line ends and reach parts of the old city and industrial estates across the expressway—creating a 31km corridor that will join the Rapid Metro in Cyber City.

The plan, a detailed project report (DPR), was approved at a meeting of the Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) in Chandigarh on Monday and will now be sent to the Union government for approval. According to it, the extension will cost approximately Rs 6,000 crore and the work is expected to begin next summer once approvals are in place and land is acquired.

“The new Metro corridor would be commissioned by 2024. We had suggested 2025 as the tentative year for commissioning, but the chief minister said it needed to be commissioned sooner,” said a GMDA official aware of the discussions at the meeting, asking not to be named.

The extension, which will likely involve an interchange— though no clarity in this regard was offered—will add 23 stations: Sector 45, Cyber Park, Sector 46, Sector 47, Sector 48, Technology Park, Udyog Vihar Phase 6, Sector 10, Sector 37, Basai, Sector 9, Sector 7, Sector 4, Sector 5, Ashok Vihar, Sector 3, Krishna Chowk, Palam Vihar Extension, Palam Vihar, Sector 23 A, Sector 22, Udyog Vihar Phase 4 and 5.

A 2-km-long extension corridor from Basai to Dwarka Expressway has been approved to improve connectivity with the upcoming expressway. Another extension, from Sector 22 to Cyber City Rapid Metro (about 3km), has also been approved.

“About Rs 5,126 crore is the original capital investment as listed in the DPR, but with inflation, it is likely to rise by a few hundred crores,” said another GMDA official, asking not to be named.

According to the agenda for Monday’s meeting (a copy of which is with Hindustan Times), an earlier route proposal connecting Gurugram to Dwarka in West Delhi was scrapped in favour of the one finalised.

Projected ridership on the Metro corridor for the year 2025 is expected to be 549,000 passenger trips per day, and is expected to grow to 879,000 by 2041.

The DPR also estimates that this corridor will generate Rs 946 crores in revenue in the first year of its launch, which is expected to grow to Rs 3,682 crores by the year 2051.

The Haryana Mass Rapid Transport Corporation (which will be implementing the project’s construction) has also recommended setting up a ‘high-power committee’ to deal with “several problems with regard to acquisition of land, diversion of utilities, shifting of structures falling on the project alignment and the rehabilitation of project-affected persons” according to the agenda for Monday’s meeting.

Metro expansion was a recurring feature in recent election campaigns, with BJP candidate Rao Inderjit Singh, and his Congress opponent, Captain (retired) Ajay Singh Yadav committing to take on such projects.

First Published:
May 28, 2019 03:44 IST

Source: Read Full Article