Commuters rejoice as Hancock bridge opened for traffic after HC nod

Now commuters can skip the 45-minute detour to reach Mazgaon from Dongri and take the bridge that cuts the travel time to just 2 minutes.

Mumbai: The much-awaited Hancock road over bridge (ROB) finally opened for traffic on Monday after six years. The bridge reopened an hour after the Bombay high court allowed Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) to throw open the partially completed Hancock bridge, connecting Mazgaon and Dongri.

Hancock Bridge opened for public at Mazgaon, (Anshuman Poyrekar/HT PHOTO)

Now commuters can skip the 45-minute detour to reach Mazgaon from Dongri and take the bridge that cuts the travel time to just 2 minutes. The civic body demolished the 148-year-old British-era bridge in 2016 after it was declared dilapidated and the reconstruction work began in 2019.

The two-lane bridge was scheduled to open before the pandemic hit in 2020 but the work took two years to complete. The BMC was scheduled to open two lanes on Hancock bridge on June 15, which was later extended to July 15 after which it again hit a roadblock when residents of Wallace Fortuna society in Mazgaon, including Congress MLA Amin Patel, filed a writ petition in the Bombay high court seeking direct access to the bridge via a ramp.

The HC order came after the BMC assured the court that a solution would be worked out for the society, which had opposed the opening of the bridge and secured a stay till their grievance was addressed. The division bench of justices R D Dhanuka and Kamal Khata was informed that the society was seeking direct access to the bridge as the road to the society alongside the bridge was not wide enough for the entry of fire tenders. This, the petition had stated would pose a threat to the members of the society and hence the opening of the bridge should be stayed till their grievance was addressed.

However, the BMC, through advocates Anil Sakhare and Yashodeep Deshmukh, opposed the petition stating that the civic body would undertake a feasibility study to consider the demands of the society.

Sakhare stressed the fact that the people of both Mazgaon and Dongri had been inconvenienced since the bridge had been dismantled. He further submitted that as the other British-era Carnac Bundar bridge was also in a bad condition and needed to be dismantled urgently, hence there should be no delay in opening the Hancock bridge.

After hearing both sides, the bench accepted the submissions of the BMC and in the larger interest of the public allowed the civic authority to throw open the bridge within 48 hours.

Satish Thosar, the chief engineer of the BMC bridges department, told HT, “The court has permitted us to open the bridge for traffic but the case is still on regarding providing access to through ramp for the society. There were a lot of hiccups and challenges faced.”

The total cost incurred for the two-lane bridge is ₹70 crore for the first phase. In the second phase, BMC will widen the two lanes by removing structures on that stretch.

Thosar added that with the Hancock bridge opened for traffic, the BMC will now focus on demolishing Carnac Bunder Bridge.