Ahmedabad: Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani today after paying visit to Ahmedabad Metro project site in East Ahmedabad told media persons that first metro train will start running in Ahmedabad in January 2019. He said the ongoing works on metro project across the city will be completed by December 2019.

First metro train will run on Vastral to Apparel park route in East Ahmedabad. It will be a 6.5 km route covering 6 stations, Rupani said adding that construction work on this route will complete in October this year.

Rupani said making of train and coaches, signal, construction of third railway station, communication etc works are in progress. Construction of control room and depot at Apparel park is nearly complete.

’40 km phase-1 project will in total have 33.5 km elevated and 7 km underground route with 32 metro stations including 4 underground metro stations. Estimated project cost is Rs 10,700 crore, of whic Rs 6,000 crore is loan from JICA,’ Rupani said.

He said, priority route – 2 will be 5 km long with 4 metro stations on Gyaspur – Paldi route, civil work for which will complete in January 2019.

‘Passengers from Paldi will arrive at Kalupur railway station in metro train and travel further to Mumbai by bullet train. Metro train, bullet train and regular trains will run in three separate layers at Kalupur railway station. It is complex engineering project technically,’ Rupani said.

‘We have chosen underground route in wall city area. If it was surface route, people could face difficulty for two years. We intend to cause minimum hardship to people. East-West corridor is 6.5 km long. It is underground route. We have instructed MEGA company officials to see that the works are completed at earliest without causing difficulty to people,’ he further said.

‘Tunnel boring machine works for 6.53 km underground route started in April 2018 from Apparel park. Over 500 meter tunnel work is in progress. Works for up and down tunnels from Kalupur towards Saraspur are in progress,’ he said.

‘Paldi to Sabarmati – Motera route work is in progress and it will be completed by December 2019. From Shahpur underground metro station to Thaltej route will be elevated one crossing the river Sabarmati. 2 km elevated route work from Doordarshan to Manav mandir on this route is completed while rest is in progress and it will be completed by December 2019,’ he said.

‘The works are going on full fledged and speedily. Train and coaches are into making, works for tracks, bridges, underground portion and station are going on, designs are finalised, approval related to protected monuments has been obtained, there are no approvals pending and there’s no case going on in the Supreme Court. We hope to complet the works by December 2019,’ Rupani said.

Trial run by January 2019

– As per the provisions of rolling stock contract, a mock-up model of coach will arrive in Ahmedabad by September 2018 end. It will be put at Sabarmati Riverfront house or other public place so that the people can view it.

– 2 km viaduct has been completed in East-West corridor’s Western portion. Procedure of launching of further 2 km viaduct is going on.

– Process of construction of a new bridge for Metro train is going on next to existing Gandhi bridge over river Sabarmati. Elevated viaduct from West will cross the river and go to underground track on Eastern side in Shahpur area. Four TBM machines have so far created 0.65 km long tunnel. Up and Down tunnels shall be seperate.

– In North – Sout corridor, works are going on from both ends. A 5 km viaduct has been completed. RCC work of three station is nearly complete.

– Vastral – Apparel park priority reach route viaduct is completed and track and traction related works are going on. Works for six stations on this route are also speedily progressing and soon to be complete. Apparel park depot is nearly complete and will be ready for operation by October 2018.

– Trial run on this route is likely to start in January 2019.

DeshGujarat