Mumbai: 27-hour mega block on Central Railway route for dismantling of British-era Carnac Bridge | So Good News

The Central Railway (CR) will conduct a 27-hour mega block from Saturday evening to dismantle the British-era Carnac Bridge between Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) and Masjid Bunder station in South Mumbai.

The mega block will start at 23:00 (November 19) and end at 2:00 on November 21, due to which the schedule of suburban and express trains will be affected during this period, said a release from CR.

The special block is likely to affect more than 37 lakh daily local train commuters as well as those traveling by outstation trains. More than 1,800 local train services operate on Central Railway’s Mumbai suburban network consisting of ‘Harbour’ and ‘Main’ lines originating from CSMT in South Mumbai.

Built in 1866-67, the bridge was declared unsafe by an expert team at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IITB) in 2018, though the movement of heavy vehicles on it was stopped in 2014 itself, railway officials said.

In the release, CR said: ”The blockade will be operated to dismantle the Carnac Bridge which was declared unsafe for road traffic in the month of September this year.” Officials said that a large part of the iron bridge has already been declared unsafe for road traffic. demolished. During the blockade, only the iron structure of the railway over the bridge (ROB) will therefore be cut and removed using road cranes.

CR General Manager Anil Kumar Lahoti, Divisional Railway Manager Rajnish Kumar Goyal and other senior officials inspected the demolition work on Friday and issued necessary instructions.

”The heritage bridge has around six stones with inscriptions mentioning the year of construction. These will be preserved in an appropriate manner either at cultural monuments or museum grounds, said CR’s head of PR Shivaji Sutar.

On the main line of CR route (CSMT to Kasara/Khopoli), the block will be operated between CSMT and Byculla stations for 17 hours. This means that no trains will run between CSMT and Byculla station before 4pm on November 20 from 11pm on Saturday, the notification said. On the harbor line (CSMT-Goregaon/ Panvel), the block will be operated between CSMT and Vadala stations for 21 hours. No trains will run between CSMT and Vadala stations before 8 pm on November 20 from 11 pm on Saturday, it said.

The Mail-Express Yard lines will be made available after 27 hours, which means at 2 a.m. on Nov. 21, the release added.

During the block period, suburban trains will be run from Byculla, Parel, Dadar, Kurla stations towards Thane, Kalyan, Kasara, Karjat side and vice versa, while on the harbor line, the services will be run between Vadala and Panvel-Goregaon stations, it said.

“Since we have limited platforms for reversal of trains at Byculla, Parel, Dadar, Kurla and Vadala stations, we will run trains with less frequency,” CR said in the release and asked passengers to avoid unnecessary crowding at suburban stations.

CR said that they have asked the public transport bodies to run extra buses for the convenience of commuters during the block period and they have agreed to do so. To avoid traffic congestion, 18 pairs of Mail-Express trains have been canceled and 68 mail/express trains have been either short-terminated or short-terminated at Dadar, Panvel Pune and Nashik stations, the release said.

During the intervening night of Saturday and Sunday as well as Sunday and Monday, CR will also operate a special traffic and power block for ROB beams being launched at Kopri between Mulund and Thane for more than two hours each, the release said.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is automatically generated from a syndicated feed.)