Here's some good news on the much-delayed Thane-Diva additional rail lines. As per the latest update from Central Railway, construction work on the 11-year-old pending 9-km stretch of additional lines may finally be finished by December as the rail bridge over the creek is in final stages of completion and the routes will open to the public by 2021 subject to train trials.

The project, which was sanctioned in 2008, is part of Mumbai Urban Transport Project (MUTP 2B) and crucial for the Central Railway (CR) as it will be a key factor in segregating the outstation and local train rail corridor, and thus improve the speed/frequency of trains. The first deadline was December 2015, which was later revised to December 2017, then to March 2019, June 2020 and is now pushed to 2021. The cost has escalated from Rs 130 crore to Rs 440 crore.