Mumbai Road Concretisation: BMC Completes Only 29% Of Planned Works, Halts New Cement Roads Ahead Of Monsoon

Mumbai: With only nine days remaining to complete all ongoing roadworks, the BMC has completed only 28.87% of the total roads undertaken for concretisation. Including both phase I and II, a total of 2121 roads across the city were undertaken for cement concreting, of which as of May 21, 390 roads are completed and 989 are in progress. While the concretisation work on 728 roads has either not yet started or on hold. The BMC has a May 31 deadline to complete the ongoing works.

On Wednesday, BMC halted the Pavement Quality Concrete (PQC) work under the Cement Concrete Road Project and now no new road concreting work will be carried out for the season. The remaining work will be carried forward to the next season, that is, post-monsoon. However, to make all the roads motorable before the onset of monsoon, the contractors are directed to use mastic asphalt.

The contractors are directed to start the asphalting work by May 25 and if they fail to do so, the work will be handed over to another contractor, and a penalty of equal to twice the amount incurred for the work will be imposed on the original contractor.

“Our objective is to complete the road junction-to-junction for motorists to use. The barricading needs to be removed as it causes traffic jams. After the two days of rainfall alert, we will get time to complete the ongoing road works,” said Additional Municipal Commissioner Abhijit Bangar.

The BMC has been slammed from all sides for not undertaking the mega project of all cement concretisation of all roads in Mumbai. The citizens and activists blame BMC for poor management, monitoring and accountability.

With 71% of the total roads still in progress, serious concerns are raised about the quality of work.