News Archive
Mumbai harbour bridge goes wider
Released on 11/07/2008
Authorities in Maharashtra want eight lanes instead of six on the new bridge from Mumbai to the mainland, pushing the price of one of the world’s longest trans-ocean structures to US$1.7 billion.
Having cancelled the public private partnership scheme for construction of the Mumbai trans-harbour link, the Maharashtra government is reported to have entrusted the work to the state’s road development and regional development corporations.
The concept is to build road and rail links between the island of Mumbai and the new Mumbai territories on the Indian mainland.
This ambitious project requires spanning the harbour with a 22km bridge, one of the world’s longest trans-ocean structures.
Engineering, procurement and construction bids recently submitted by two construction consortia were running at around US$1.4 billion, but cost estimates have now risen to around US$1.7 billion, because the government wants to widen the bridge from six lanes to eight.
This most likely means that the authorities want to see land developed across the water from crowded Mumbai island.
Land values have risen sharply in New Mumbai since the bridge was announced. But how the government might recover some of that growth to help fund the project has not been explained.
The public private partnership previously agreed was scrapped on grounds that the bids submitted last month by the rival consortia were ‘unrealistic’.
The final showdown was between Sea King Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services promoted by Mukesh Ambani, and the Anil Ambani-led RELINFRA-Hyundai consortium.
Major Indian contracting groups such as Gammon India, Larsen & Toubro and Hindustan Construction Company also submitted bids and are expected to renew their interest in the project when it goes out to tender once more.
