The Ghaziabad district administration has given permission of starting construction work for the major infrastructure projects Regional Rapid Transit System (RRTS) and Delhi-Meerut Expressway.
The permissions follows guidelines from the Union ministry of home affairs (MHA) that allowed for construction activities that followed social distancing norms and had labourers on site (called in-situ construction activities) from May 4 when phase-3 of the lockdown began.
Secretary of the Ghaziabad development authority, S K Rai, confirmed that the permissions for the two projects was given.
Officials related to the projects said that they have started with limited construction activity and will scale up work in coming few weeks.
“At present, we have started work at our casting yard at Vasundhara. We have also prepared our standard operating protocols (SOPs) for work,” said Sudhir Sharma, chief public relations officer of the NCR Transport Corporation (NCRTC) that is in charge of the RRTS.
People with NCRTC said that about 1,000 workers are on-site at present.
The NCRTC has already started work for a 17-km priority stretch of the project that connects Delhi, Ghaziabad and Meerut over a stretch of 82km.
Bombardier to build trains
{{/usCountry}}Bombardier to build trains
{{/usCountry}}In another major development, the NCRTC officials said that they have also finalised bids for procurement of rolling stock of the Delhi-Ghaziabad-Meerut RRTS corridor under the Make in India initiative of the central government.
The rolling stock will be 30 trains of six coaches each for the Delhi-Ghaziabad-Meerut corridor and another set of 10 trains having three coaches each for metro-like train services in Meerut. Officials said that the supply cost will be about ₹1560 crore (excluding taxes) and the first train will be supplied in 2022.
“The train sets will be manufactured by Bombardier Transportation India Private Limited at their Savli plant in Gujarat. The winning bid offered to manufacture 100% of the rolling stock using 83% local content,” Sharma added.
Under the conditions of the bid, at least 75% was to be mandatorily manufactured in India and purchase preference would also be given to manufacturers using more than 50% local content (local technology etc).
NCRTC officials said that the rolling stock will be the first of its kind in the country with a design speed of 180kmph. The trains will be designed with high-acceleration and high-deceleration component that trains need to undergo given the maximum operational speed of 160kmph and stations at every 5-10kms.
The trains will also have automatic plug-in type doors reducing air-friction and noise.
“Keeping the commuter convenience in mind, the 3.2-meter wide RRTS trains will have 2x2 transverse seating arrangements like ones in Shatabdi Express trains and also have comfortable standing space. There will be enough space for luggage, CCTV cameras, and other modern amenities,” said an officer from NCRTC.
Delhi-Meerut Expressway
National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) officials said that they have started work on the Delhi Meerut Expressway project at Vijay Nagar under phase 2 (UP-Gate to Dasna) and phase 4 stretch from Dasna to Meerut.
“Although we have started construction, 75% of our workers had left for their home towns amid the coronavirus crisis. We are trying to rope in local workers to increase workforce availability to 40%. At present, we estimate that only 15-20% work efficiency with limited workers and timing restrictions from 7am to 7pm,” said RP Singh, project director of NHAI.
According to officials, the entire project was to get complete by this month but likely to be delayed by about six months due to the lockdown and the upcoming monsoon season.
“We require about 100 clear working days to finish the pending project work. But this can be achieved when we work with optimum workers,” he added.