CR, WR turn lockdown to their advantage, fix old, dangerous bridges

Finally citys old and dangerous road overbridges got the muchneeded attention thanks to the COVID19 lockdown Central Railway and Western Railway turned the restriction on publics movement to its advantage by fixing the bridges along their respective linesWhile CR completed work on Byculla road bridge National Highway bridge at Kasara and the busy road overbridge at Kopar WR fixed a bridge crossing the lines at Dharavi and the one in Andheri is nearcompletion26 days to fix Byulla bridgeThe old Byculla road overbridge was patched up with 70 bracket fixtures over the past 26 days at a cost of R13811 lakh the complete project was worth R113 crore Without lockdown it would have taken more than two months to finish the work a senior official pointed outCR fixed the bridge near Umbermali station with the help of National Highway Authority of India NHAI in the last four days of AprilOn Western Railway work on strengthening the important Dharavi bridge girders was completed during the lockdown In addition one span of Andheri pipeline bridge was strengthened WRs chief spokesperson Ravinder Bhakar saidCR takes NHAI helpAnother important work on CR was to patch up the road overbridge near Umbermali in Kasara which had been declared dangerous in the IITBombay survey The bridge was fixed in the last four days of April taking advantage of the lockdown and with assistance from the National Highway Authority of India NHAIThe bridge near Umbermali station of Mumbai suburban railway was taken up for repairs following the joint recommendation of the IITB and the railways CR sought the NHAIs assistance since the bridge passes under the MumbaiAgra National Highway near Shirol village over the rail lines between Umbermali and Kasara stations The work involved repair of the slab upgrade removing and relaying concrete dismantling of about two metres of parapet wall and recasting it firmlyWork sans disruptionAn official involved in the upgrade said the work was completed in just a few days and involved no train cancellations We called 15 labourers from the NHAI and seven from the railways and all the problems raised in the IIT survey were resolved he addedAdditionally the dismantling and upgrade work of road overbridge at Kopar has also been taken up in coordination with KalyanDombivli Municipal Corporation Had there been no lockdown the work would have required a block leading to disruption in services of numerous local and outstation trainsInitially it was decided to use diamond cutters that would have required 45 days with two hours of daily blocks at night Now during the lockdown its being done with concrete breaker in day time Work started on April 17 an official said The lockdown has given us an opportunity to renew and pump energy into the old infrastructure CRs chief public relations officer Shivaji Sutar saidIn 2019 CR and WR had identified weak and corrosive bridges along the lines with the help of IITB teams The joint safety audit has being conducted of all the 445 road overbridges and foot overbridges in Mumbai in order to ensure commuters safetyCatch up on all the latest Mumbai news crime news current affairs and a complete guide from food to things to do and events across Mumbai Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updates MidDay is now on Telegram Click here to join our channel middayinfomedialtd and stay updated with the latest news