30% construction work completed on Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train Project

New Delhi, India (Urban Transport News): India's First High Speed Bullet Train project connecting Mumbai and Ahmedabad has been under construction for more than five years, with only 30.15% overall physical progress as of March 31, 2023. The National High Speed Rail Corporation Ltd. (NHSRCL) has estimated the cost of the project to be approximately Rs 108,000 crore, and the first trial run of the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail Corridor (MAHSR) is scheduled for August 2026 on about 50-km track between Surat and Bilimora in Gujarat.

The Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail Corridor will consist of 92% of high-speed elevated railway tracks via viaducts, bridges, tunnels, and embankments/cutting. The rail route between Mumbai and Thane on the northern side will feature a seven-kilometre undersea tunnel in the Thane Creek Flamingo Sanctuary (TCFS) sector, recognized as a Ramsar Site in August 2022, to avoid disturbing the flamingos and other species in the adjacent rich mangroves.

The 21 km tunnel will be India's first undersea tunnel, measuring 13.2 metres in diameter, and will be constructed at Thane Creek between underground stations at Bandra-Kurla Complex and Shilphata in Maharashtra. The initial cost of the C2 package was pegged at Rs 100 crore, but the cost has now increased to Rs 10,000 crore due to building an underground tunnel, making it the country's longest rail transport corridor.

The Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail Corridor will cover a distance of 508.17 km between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, with 12 stations en route, and is the only sanctioned high-speed rail project in the country. The high-speed train will operate at 320 kmph, covering the distance in just about two hours, saving time compared to current travel time between the two terminal stations by about nine hours (by bus) or six hours (by conventional railways).

Work progress on the Gujarat side is slightly more than one-third completed (35.23%), but on the Maharashtra side, it is a dismal 19.65% accomplished. So far, 56.34% of the civil work has been completed. Pile construction has also been completed for a stretch of 272.89 kilometres, while pier construction has been finished on 170.56 km. Additionally, the project has seen the launch of 45.40 km of girders.

The government is yet to determine a final deadline for the entire project, and the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Bullet Train project is unlikely to begin full operations until 2027. The cost of this project is likely to increased from Rs 1.08 Lakh crore to Rs 2.0 Lakh crore.