Central Railway demolished the Hancock Bridge in 2016, and four years later, the reconstruction work is now all set to pick up the pace. Since the last two years, officials were negligent about the reconstruction work and the lack of a bridge has resulted in inconvenience for the local residents on a daily basis. However, it seems that these hassles are about to end for the passengers as Central Railway has approved the application for installation of girder in the area.
While Central Railway has approved the application, the construction work will only begin after the Commission of Railway Safety (CRS) provides permission for the same.
After the demolition of the Hancock Bridge, the number of rail accidents due to people crossing tracks had increased. Owing to this, the people demanded that the bridge should be built immediately but the reconstruction project faced various obstacles. One of the incidents which occurred in the recent past was when the BMC had appointed a contractor through the bidding process but the contractor was found guilty for corruption in a road construction project. Post this people filed a PIL against the contractor and the court ordered immediate his removal from the project. However, when the tender was issued, the Goods and Service Tax (GST) Act came to effect, forcing the civic body to re-issue the tender.
It is said that the bridge will be constructed at a cost ₹41 crore and the work for the project had begun in February 2018 but due to lack of resources, the construction work was ongoing at snail-pace. The civic body then wrote to Central Railway's Bridge Department seeking permission to install a girder and the application was approved on December 30, 2019. This has been forwarded to Commission of Railway Safety (CRS) who will be providing the final nod for the project.
It is possible that the project might be approved this month itself and therefore, BMC is claiming that if the work begins in January, they will be able to finish the construction prior to the onset of monsoon. Besides this, BMC will have to relocate the overhead wire in order to construct the bridge, which will cost the municipal corporation ₹39.3 crores.
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