The Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail Corridor, also known as the bullet train project, has achieved a major milestone with the completion of 100 per cent land acquisition across Gujarat, Maharashtra and Dadra and Nagar Haveli.
The National High-Speed Rail Corporation Limited (NHSRCL), the implementing agency of the project, announced on January 8 that it has acquired the entire 1389.49 hectares of land required for the project. Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw also confirmed the status of land acquisition on X.
The project, which is being built using Japan’s Shinkansen technology, aims to create a high-frequency mass transportation system between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, covering a distance of 508 km in about two hours.
The NHSRCL said that the work on the project is in full swing, with several civil, structural and technical works underway. Some of the highlights of the project are:
- The laying of the first reinforced concrete track bed for the bullet train corridor, using the J-slab ballastless track system, has started in Surat and Anand. This is the first time this system is being used in India.
- The first mountain tunnel, 350 metres long and 12.6 metres in diameter, has been completed near Zaroli village in Valsad district of Gujarat in just 10 months.
- The first steel bridge, spanning 70 meters and weighing 673 MT, has been erected across NH 53 in Surat. Out of 28 such bridges, 16 are in various stages of fabrication.
- The bridge construction has been completed on six rivers out of 24 on the bullet train corridor, namely Par, Purna, Mindhola, Ambika, Auranga and Venganiya. The work on the Narmada, Tapti, Mahi and Sabarmati rivers is in progress.
- Noise barriers are being erected on either side of the viaduct to reduce the noise generated by the train and civil structures during operations.
- Work has started for India’s first 7 km undersea rail tunnel, which is a part of the 21 km-long tunnel between the Bandra Kurla Complex and Shilphata in Maharashtra. Excavation works for the construction of Mumbai HSR station have also begun.
- HSR stations in Gujarat’s Vapi, Bilimora, Surat, Bharuch, Anand, Vadodara, Ahmedabad and Sabarmati are in various stages of construction.
The project has been funded by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) with a soft loan of Rs 88,000 crore from Japan. The project was expected to be completed by 2022 but faced delays in land acquisition. The government has set a target to run the first phase of the bullet train between Surat and Bilimora in south Gujarat by 2026.
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