Salt lake Sector 5 to Phoolbagan metro: All about the east west metro route

[ecis2016.org] Check out all the details of the Kolkata Metro Line 2, also known as the East West metro route that connects Salt lake metro station to Phoolbagan metro station.

Kolkata Metro Line 2, also known as the East West Metro route, is considered as one of the most advanced infrastructure projects in the country. Earlier, in February 2020, Railway minister Piyush Goyal had flagged-off the first phase of the Kolkata Metro East-West corridor, connecting Sector V of Salt Lake, the IT hub of the city, with the Yuva Bharati Krirangan stadium. The inaugural train zoomed-off from the Kolkata Metro station at Sector V to traverse a 4.88-km distance to the Stadium, as Goyal said that the entire 16.5-km stretch of the corridor – till Howrah Maidan – was likely to be completed in two years. Commercial services, connecting six over-ground stations – Sector V, Karunamoyee, Central Park, City Centre, Bengal Chemical and Salt Lake Stadium stations – began on February 14, 2020.

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The entire east west metro route from Howrah metro and Salt Lake metro is expected to be operational by January 2023. It was earlier scheduled to be operational by June 2022.

Here’s everything you need to know about Kolkata’s East-West Corridor.

Salt lake metro to Phoolbagan metro route fare

Kolkata Metro had announced an increase in fares after a gap of six years, on November 26, 2019.

While the minimum fare of Rs 5 was left untouched for the first two-kilometre journey, it has been increased to Rs 10 for the next three kilometres. The fare has been increased by Rs 5 for all the subsequent stages from the existing rates. The new fare came into effect from December 5, 2019.

East west metro route stations

Total length: 16.6 kms, connecting the twin cities of Kolkata and Howrah.

Expected project completion: Jan 2023

Unique feature: The county’s first underwater tunnel – a 520-metre twin tunnel, one east-bound and the other west-bound – will be built 30 metres below the riverbed of the Hooghly river.

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The east west metro route in Kolkata is also known as the Green Line and covers a total length of 16.6 kilometres. The section from Salt Lake Sector 5 to Phoolbagan metro station, covering a length of 7 km, became operational in October 2020. The 2.3-km Phoolbagan to Sealdah metro route is expected to be operational in 2022. In August 2021, the first train trial was performed from Phoolbagan to Sealdah station.

The Salt Lake Sector 5 metro station will also link the 29.8-km Kolkata Metro line 6 or the orange line connecting New Garia with Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport through the satellite towns of Salt Lake and New Town. The stations of Metro line 2 and Metro line 6 will be connected by over-bridge.

The route will be further extended and will connect Teghoria / Haldiram in the east to Howrah Maidan in the west. There are a total of 17 stations that includes an elevated metro route of 5.8 kms with 11 stations and underground metro route of 10.8 kms with six metro stations. The metro route will cover a total length 22 kilometres.

East west metro route: Underwater tunnel in Kolkata

Kolkata city will also get its first underwater tunnel that will be developed 33 metres below the riverbed of the river Hooghly. The tunnel will link the twin cities of Kolkata and Howrah. About 520 metres of the 16.6-km distance of the metro route will be developed under the riverbed.

East west metro route project cost

The union cabinet, on October 7, 2020, finally approved the revised cost for the East-West Metro Corridor project. The estimated completion cost is now Rs 8,575 crores and the completion date is December 2021.

Earlier, in February 2020, Railway minister Piyush Goyal had said that Rs 6,500 crores had so far been spent for the East-West Metro project.

The East-West Metro corridor has received a grant of Rs 905 crores – the highest among the five projects currently underway in Kolkata. The New Garia-NSCBI Airport link, slated to be completed by June 2021, has been allotted Rs 328 crores, while the Noapara-Barasat line has received a grant of Rs 200 crores, the metro official said, on February 5, 2020. “Depending on the progress of work, demands will be placed for additional funds, which is normally provided in the revised estimate,” he explained.

The 16.6-km Joka-BBD Bag route, connecting the south-eastern suburbs of Behala with the heart of the city, has been granted Rs 99 crores and the Barrackpore-Baranagar and Dakshineswar stretch, covering a distance of 14.5 kms, has been allotted Rs 10 crores, the official said. Funds would not be a constraint for any of the five projects, he added.

The general manager of Eastern Railway and Metro Railway, Arun Arora, recently said that trains are expected to start running between Joka and Taratala by the end of the year 2022. The revised deadline for the completion of the full corridor is July 2025, he added.

East West Metro route: Impact on real estate

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The Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) London has recognised the Kolkata East-West Metro project, which has built a twin tunnel under river Hooghly – a first of its kind in the country – as a project that has a significant impact in making people’s lives better.

“The Institution of Civil Engineers, London, UK, has recognised the Kolkata East-West Metro project of the Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation Ltd (KMRCL) and selected it as one of the 200 projects across the globe, which has a significant impact in making people’s lives better,” a KMRCL statement, in September 2017, said. “It is a unique international acknowledgement for this project, amongst a handful of projects picked from India,” the statement said. KMRCL has completed construction of twin tunnels under River Hooghly, an engineering feat and the first of its kind in India.

Kolkata Metro ridership

The Kolkata East-West Metro will ferry 1 million passengers per day by 2035, a senior Railways official said, on July 24, 2019. The Metro Railway Kolkata registered its ‘highest-ever’ footfall of 9.22 lakh commuters on October 3, an official said, on October 9, 2019. It carried 49.5 lakh passengers during the Durga Puja days, from ‘Chaturthi’ to ‘Navami’ (October 2-7, 2019), spokesperson Indrani Banerjee said. The 49.5-lakh passenger count is 5.7% more than the number of people it carried in the previous year, Banerjee said. On October 15, 2018, it had carried 9.07 lakh commuters, which is the second-highest footfall in its history, the spokesperson added.

The East West Metro route project of the Kolkata Metro Railway Corporation Ltd (KMRCL) has been witness to prolonged delays, for various reasons – from clearances to land acquisition issues. Completion of construction of tunnels under river Hooghly in June 2017, was a major milestone for the project, which will have a 10.8-km underground corridor, while the rest would be elevated. The first phase of the Kolkata Metro in the North-South route was commenced commercially on October 24, 1984. The route now covers 27.23 kms, from Noapara in the north to Kavi Subhash station in the southern part of the city.

Kolkata East-West Metro tunnelling work status

The Calcutta HC, on February 11, 2020, allowed the resumption of tunnel-boring work for the city’s East-West Metro corridor, which had come to a halt after an aquifer burst in August 2019 leading to severe ground subsidence and collapse of buildings. Accepting a report by IIT-Madras, the Calcutta High Court directed the Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation (KMRC), the executing agency for the East-West Metro corridor, to restart work between Esplanade and Sealdah stations in Bowbazar area of central Kolkata, in consultation with the institute. The division bench comprising chief justice TBN Radhakrishnan and justice Arijit Banerjee had, in September 2019, ordered the suspension of tunnelling work till further orders. Three months later, the KMRC, in view of a report prepared by its expert committee, moved the court seeking its permission to resume work. On a prayer by an NGO to get the expert committee report vetted by an independent agency, the KMRC then requested IIT-Madras to review its findings. The institute, in its report, stated that tunnelling work could be resumed.

The court was hearing a PIL seeking termination of underground drilling for metro tunnels in congested areas. The PIL has also challenged the provisions of Metro Railway (Construction of Works) Act, 1978. Two tunnel boring machines (TBMs) were deployed to dig two parallel tunnels for the underground East-West Metro, when the accident in Bowbazar happened involving one of these on August 31, 2019. Several buildings in the congested area collapsed or developed cracks, leaving hundreds homeless.

Tunnels have been bored under the Hooghly river to connect the twin cities of Kolkata and Howrah through the rapid transit system, spanning a length of 16.6 km from Howrah Maidan to IT hub Sector V in Salt Lake. The tunneling had begun at Howrah Maidan on April 21, 2016 and took 23 months to pass under the Hooghly river, the Burrabazar wholesale business hub and several heritage buildings in Benoy Badal Dinesh Bagh, also called the Dalhousie area, to reach Esplanade in the heart of the city, on March 22, 2018. Beth El and Magen David synagogues, St Andrews church, Writers Buildings (the secretariat), Old Telegraph office and Raj Bhawan and Esplanade Mansion, are some of the important buildings under which tunneling was done.

(With inputs from PTI)

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