Mumbai: 5 upcoming biz hubs will rise as smart cities

To woo more investors and get premium pricing for land, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has decided to transform all upcoming commercial hubs into smart cities.

To woo more investors and get premium pricing for land, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has decided to transform all upcoming commercial hubs into smart cities.

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A smart city will have public Wi-Fi, integrated CCTV camera network, smart parking system, solar lighting apps to find utilities, among other things.

For this, the MMRDA has identified Panvel, Kalyan, Alibaug-Pen, Bhiwandi and Vasai-Virar, which will be connected to Navi Mumbai International airport through the proposed Virar-Alibaug multimodal corridor (VAMC).

“To strengthen the brand value of commercial hubs, we need to add as many components as possible. We want the hubs to be equipped with advanced facilities before they are made operational,” said UPS Madan, MMRDA commissioner.

Last month, a think tank from South Korea came up with a proposal to create these centres along the VAMC.

The MMRDA has already undertaken the Smart BKC project, where the Bandra-Kurla Complex (BKC) is set to be developed as a smart city by next year.

The smart city project is being implemented on build-operate- transfer (BOT) mode. The MMRDA issued tenders for the BKC project in October, but the authority will have to start afresh as the state government has suggested a few changes.

“The information technology department wants the number of people working on the project to be reduced. So we are going to invite fresh tenders,” Madan said.

While the Wadala Truck Terminus (WTT) area is also set to be developed as a smart city, the MMRDA is not keen about going ahead with the project in the Oshiwara district centre, as it involves acquisition of a large chunk of private land.

There could, however, be one more commercial hub in Kanjurmarg.