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It has been nearly eight months since the tenders for building the Dahisar-Bhayander Link Road (DBLR) were floated. However, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is yet to receive any bids from contractors for the project. Civic officials, however, maintain that the final set of contractors will be finalised by the end of this week.
The DBLR is a BMC project which intends to connect Dahisar at the northernmost tip of Mumbai with the satellite town of Mira-Bhayander. This project is supposed to be the final phase of the Mumbai Coastal Road Project (MCRP), through which a direct connectivity between the island city and suburban belt will be created.
The tenders for this project were floated in October 2022 and the BMC kept a six month window for finalising the contractors. However, between March and July this year, the deadline for this project was postponed more than four times.
P. Velrasu, additional municipal commissioner (Projects) said that the extension was done as per the request of potential bidders. “This tender is now in the final stage and the bidders will be selected in the next one week. The potential bidders have requested us to extend the deadline for submitting their bids due to technical issues related to IT. We have also extended it in the interest of having more competition among the bidders so that we can get the job done at the best possible rate,” Velrasu told Express.
The cost of this project has been pegged at Rs 3,186 crore and civic officials said that being a key infrastructure project, the bidders have raised multiple queries before submitting their bids. “The proposed link road will pass through mangrove patches and creeks that will require an innovative design. Over the past few months we had been receiving queries from bidders related to technical aspects, therefore we decided to extend the deadline,” said an official.
The proposed elevated road will be 5.6 Kilometre long, out of which 1.5 kms will be under jurisdiction of BMC, while 4.1 kms will be under the jurisdiction of Mira-Bhayander Municipal Corporation (MBMC). The BMC is the planning and executing agency for this project and their main objective of creating this arterial road is to declutter the daily traffic movement at Dahisar Check Naka, where vehicles pass towards Vasai, Virar, Palghar, Gujarat and northwards to Delhi via Western Express Highway which further extends as National Highway 48.
The elevated bridge will be 45 metres wide and will be built on stilts. It will have 4×4 lanes, to allow smooth traffic flow. Civic officials said that emergency lanes for passing emergency vehicles like ambulance and fire-brigade engines will also be created on both sides. The BMC is also exploring options for creating a multi-level car parking and creating a transport bay beneath this arterial road.
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