Mumbai to get India’s longest ‘water metro’

Mumbai would soon be home to India's longest passenger water-ways, also touted as water metro, but a similar system for cargo will not happen for the time-being.

Updated on: Feb 21, 2013, 24:04:39 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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Mumbai would soon be home to India's longest passenger water-ways, also touted as water metro, but a similar system for cargo will not happen for the time-being.

The ministry's Expert Appraisal Committee (EAC) has approved the passenger water transport system on the western coast, not the one in eastern coast, which was primarily to ferry cargo include vehicles.

The apparent reason is that the passenger water transport system could ease traffic in south Mumbai, thereby compensating the environmental loss by construction of six stations for the 55 km long waterway whereas the environmental benefit of cargo waterway would not be substantial.

"With natural environment facilitating, the development of waterways would be an alternative in Mumbai to ease commuting and have on time and fuel consumption," the EAC said, in its final decision.

The committee approved six water transport terminals ---- at Nariman Point, Bandra, Juhu, Versova, Marve and Borivali --- proposed by Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation at the cost of Rs 750 crore. In package I, terminals would be built at Nariman Point, Bandra and Juhu and the remaining would be developed in phase package-II.

The offshore developmental activities would include terminal buildings, access roads and amenities such as ticket counters, arrival and departure lounges, restaurants and shops. The onshore development would include berthing and waiting facilities.

The committee has, however, placed strict environmental conditions for the project such as no reclamation of land for the project. The corporation will have to seek approval of Bombay High Court to remove 1000 sq meters of mangroves to build approach roads to terminals and ensure that route of the fishing vessels is not blocked because of the waterway, the EAC said.

The EAC has also instructed that the passenger terminals would be integrated with other public transport systems such as buses and noise barriers would be installed at the post Nariman Point terminal.

Mumbai would be starting point for international quality waterways. The water resource ministry officials said more such waterways have been proposed for Goa, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, whose feasibility studies were being done.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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