The Hindu : New Delhi News : Construction of Metro Phase II: most difficult with 19 bridges

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Wednesday, Dec 12, 2007
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New Delhi

Construction of Metro Phase II: most difficult with 19 bridges

Smriti Kak Ramachandran

It will go over flyovers and four major railway crossings

NEW DELHI: The expansion of the Delhi Metro railway network across the city holds the promise of fast and smooth public transportation, but for the rail system itself, reaching out to more people means negotiating difficult terrain that includes major roads, flyovers, drains and railway tracks that come in its way.

The ongoing Phase II of construction work is the most difficult for the mass rapid transit system. Officials at the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation claim that overcoming these crossovers is not just an arduous task, but a time consuming one as well.

“The Phase II of constructions will see the Delhi Metro cover more than 120 km across eight lines. This phase of construction is also the most difficult,” said Chief Public Relations Officer Anuj Dayal.

The construction involves the building of 19 longer spans (bridges) of more than 34 metres to enable crossing major roads, flyovers, drains and railway tracks.

Traversing past these crossovers, which are difficult portions of construction activities, requires more manpower hours and the DMRC is rushing to meet the deadlines set for each of these eight lines with minimum disturbance to vehicular movement.

In situ method

“Most of these spans will be constructed in situ method. The casting of segments will be done on site and a machine called bridge builder will be used to achieve this. The DMRC has decided to go for pre-cast segmental launching at the busy Vikas Marg. Two longer spans at Laxmi Nagar and Scope Tower crossings will be constructed by the pre-cast method to save time as the roads of this area are very narrow and longer duration of construction may severely effect the traffic movement.”

The Delhi Metro will cross-over four major railway crossings at Nangloi, Inderlok, Tughlakabad and Anand Vihar.

And as each crossing will be a challenge, the DMRC engineers have planned 100 metres span at Tughlakabad Rail crossing making it the longest single span in the history of Delhi Metro construction.

“With the expertise and meticulous planning the DMRC will complete most of these bridges by next year. Several safety measures and coordination with the Railways for organising blocks and utility diversions is done for achieving the construction target,” Mr. Dayal claimed.

At Peeragarhi and Punjabi Bagh, the bridge will go over flyovers and at Azadpur crossing a subway has been planned so the level of the pier will be raised to 19 metres above the ground. The Metro has also planned bridges above flyovers at Karkardooma and over road crossing at Moolchand.

“Longer spans have also been planned for crossing drains at Nangloi and Azadpur and at major road crossings on Ring Road near Moolchand and major crossings on Noida and Laxmi Nagar line,” Mr. Dayal said.

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