Mumbai: The BMC's plans to launch the second Bridge of Andheri's Gopal Krishna Gokhale Bridge by the end of the month has been delayed. Thus, this may affect the deadline for opening the second arm of the bridge, fears civic officials. So, the civic authorities will be demanding clarification from the concerned contractor about the delay. Meanwhile, the civic body has also appointed a fact finding committee on the misalignment of Gokhale Bridge and CD Barfiwala flyover.
The northern arm of Gokhale Bridge, an east-west connector in Andheri, was opened after 15 months on February 26. The parts of the second girder for the south side were expected to arrive at the Gokhale site in April, while the assembling and launching was scheduled in May. Out of 32, around 22 steel parts were expected to reach from Ambala to Mumbai and the assembling of the girder was planned by the end of April. However, this work has now been delayed.
"The work will start only when all the parts of the bridge arrive at site. After the parts are assembled, we would have to request the railways for blocks to carry out the launching work. Once this part is done, we can go ahead with work on the approach road. But now it seems this schedule will be delayed. We will ask the contractor to clarify why they couldn't ensure that the work was carried out as per schedule. A suitable action will be taken if their clarification is not found satisfactory," said a senior civic official.
As per BMC's earlier plans, the entire Gokhale Bridge along with two lanes of Barfiwala flyover will be made operational by December 2024. However, the work on the two lanes of Barfiwala flyover was undertaken immediately by the BMC after consulting the Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute (VJTI) and the Indian Institute of Technology - Bombay (IIT).
The Gokhale Bridge has been closed since November 2022, after it was declared unsafe. The new bridge is being constructed at a cost of around Rs 90 crore. The 90-meter-long Gokhale Bridge is the second-longest railover bridge after the Vidyavihar Bridge, which measures 99.8 meters.
