Mumbai's $580m monorail

Mumbai's monorail is under cosntruction

Mumbai is one of India's largest mega-cities, offering an enticing promise of work and a better standard of living, food and energy. Unfortunately, as the population swells so does traffic congestion and as result air pollution.

However the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority is set to combat this with a US$580 million monorail project. Although the project has been in development for sometime with construction actually beginning in January 2009, today it was announced that new 19.5km stretch of rail is to be added to ease traffic going into the city.

This new section will have one central depot and 17 passenger stations and is expected to serve 125,000 passengers a day by 2016.

Easing congestion

The first part of the monorail is expected to become operational at the end of the year and will cater the Chembur-Mahul-Jacob Circle route. This section of the line had a successful test run earlier in the year.

The construction of the latest section however will be done by Mott MacDonald, who were hired by Scomi Engineering to review the civil engineering design and provide technical guidance and coordination to the engineers on the project.

Speaking to Building.co.uk, Guarav Srivastava, project director for Mott MacDonald, said "With this prestigious project now on track, and expected to be complete by the end of the first quarter of 2011, Mumbai residents and workers will hopefully benefit from a healthier environment with less traffic and cleaner air."

When finished, the monorail will be able to have a top of speed of 80kph and an average speed of 65kph. Depending on the line, the capacity of the train will be more than 500 with four coaches attached, rising to 700 with six coaches.

Mumbai is currently the fifth largest city in the world with a population of 22.3 million people. Most of the population is made up of workers migrating in from the countryside in order to look for work and opportunity. As such, the monorail should make their commute much easier...

Relevant articles:

Megacities in Asia: Benefits or burdens? | Why does India need to improve its infrastructure? | India's daunting census

Timon Singh

Timon Singh is a graduate of Liverpool University where he received a degree in Social and Economic History. He has previously worked for BBC Magazines on BBC Who Do You Think You Are? Magazine, the publication for the popular genealogy show.

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