Mumbai Infrastructure Projects Hit Major Roadblock
Navi Mumbai International Airport faces hurdles
The proposed Navi Mumbai International Airport is hitting a roadblock. The airport faced major hurdles with land acquisition and environmental clearance. The estimated cost of the project is approximately Rs. 52.6 billion.
The Navi Mumbai International Airport is to be built in the Kopra-Panvel area of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. The airport aimed at decongesting Mumbai’s current air traffic. The new airport can handle 50-55 million passengers annually. The airport is being built through PPP (public-private partnership) model. It is to be located near Panvel on NH 4B, about 35 km from Mumbai International Airport. National Highway 4B will provide access to the airport from the east while Aamra Road will provide access from the west. The proposed Nhava-Sewri Trans Harbour Link will connect the airport to Mumbai.
The airport had already received clearance from the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). The first phase of the airport was supposed to be operational by 2014. However, due to major hurdles, the project hasn’t yet commenced.
The proposed airport faced two major hurdles. The first one is in relation with land acquisition. CIDCO and the state government need to acquire about 424 hectares of private land for the airport and are negotiating with residents of the seven villages. However, the land owners demanded a higher compensation for their lands. The deadlock between CIDCO and the villagers has been recently broken and the villagers have allowed the government body to conduct surveys. Some of the villagers’ demands however still prevail.
The second hurdle the airport faced was the pending clearance from the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests. The ministry did not give clearance till July this year for the location of the proposed international airport, stating that construction of the airport in the chosen location would have serious environmental implications. The ministry has however recently given a forest clearance for phase-I of the project. Phase-II clearance will be given once CIDCO has fulfilled the necessary requirements.
Though the airport now faces few hurdles, the cost of the project may significantly escalate due to prolonged delays, making the project unviable.
Reliance Infrastructure refuses to work on Mumbai Metro Project Phase II
Reliance Infrastructure which is executing the first phase of Mumbai metro line refused to work on the second phase unless it received all clearances required for the project. If the state government decides to terminate the project, this will be the second vital infrastructure project to be buried after the Rs. 5,000 crore Worli-Haji Ali sea link project. The second phase of the Mumbai metro project is worth Rs. 11,000 crore.
The metro project phase II was a 32-km metro line which would connect Navi Mumbai and the western suburbs to Bandra and Mankhurd in the east, and Charkop in the north. The project was to commence in 2011 and get completed in 2016. MMRDA has however requested the state government to terminate the concession agreement it had signed with Reliance Infra’s consortium.
A senior Reliance Infra official stated various reasons which led to the decision of not working on the project. Some of them are:
i) MMRDA had failed to fulfill their obligations as per the concession agreement including fulfilling the pre-requisite conditions for commencing the project. According to the concession agreement, MMRDA was to give 100% right of way for the project by April 2011, but till date it gave only 51% which was not contigious.
ii) The proposed sites for car depots in Mankhurd and Charkop fall under the coastal regulation zone. The central government had issued a conditional clearance to build the depots. However, the conditions made the construction of car shed depots unviable. Search for alternate plots also had not been successful.
iii) Reliance Infra also stated that the airport authority had imposed constraints on the height of construction in an area near Juhu airport.
iv) The MMTPL’s proposal of developing retail areas at each of the 27 metro stations on the route could take place only if there were amendments in the development control rules. However, these amendments had not yet been done.
