The longest and widest road tunnel of Maharashtra is nearing completion as Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) achieved breakthrough in North-South tube of Samruddhi Mahamarg on Tuesday. The 7.7 km twin tube tunnel with width of 35 meters, 17.5 meters each, is expected to be completed by end of September. The tunnel project, part of Package 14, is being helmed by Afcons, one of the leading infrastructure development company of country. Each of the tubes of the tunnel will be three laned that would provide faster movement and cut down travelling time between Nagpur and Mumbai by one third.

 

 

 

The expressway is named as Hindu Hrudaysamrat Balasaheb Thackeray Samruddhi Mahamarg and is aimed at increasing connectivity between Mumbai capital and second capital of State, Nagpur. On Tuesday afternoon, the third breakthrough at right hand side (RHS) tunnel was achieved when engineers of Afcons cut through the dense hilly terrain of Kasara ghat for an all weather road. The Kasara tunnel will be the longest and widest in State and the breakthrough is significant as same was achieved three months ahead of schedule overcoming various odds that dotted the landscape and the project. The tunnel would connect Igatpuri (Nashik) with Vashala (Thane) and the all weather road also come in handy in time of emergencies and also help security forces when needed. S K Survase, Chief Engineer, MSRDC; Hemant Jagtap, Executive Engineer, MSRDC; were present during the breakthrough ceremony at the tunnel. Shekhar Das, Project Manager, Afcons, overlooking the critical Package 14 is confidence personified as the achievement of today put forth the project on fast track and he is confident that by end of September they will hand over both the tubes of tunnel to MSRDC.

 

The tunnelling activity at the project began in September 2019 and is likely to be completed by September 2021. During mid afternoon, in presence of top officials of MSRDC, the right hand side (RHS) tunnel was completed today, meaning the North portal connectivity to South portal is direct and seamless. Das said there were many challenges, the main being the topography of the area that is known for heavy rainfall, as Igatpuri is known for highest rainfall, about 3178 mm per year. Thus for Afcons team, keeping the tunnel area dry was key issue and steps were taken to ensure dewatering so that there is no water ingress that could have put brakes on the drilling activity. In between the drilling, the specter of lockdown was a nasty surprise as the breakout of pandemic was a real cause of concern. However the team managed to keep cool and took extra precautions to emerge unscathed and avoided delaying the project. A salient point of the project is that it achieved highest excavation of 258.4m from the North portal in December 2020, and that time was the first wave of Covid-19 pandemic. Subsequently as drilling progress, the excavation was in excess of 200m of tunnel excavation for nine consecutive months.

 

Das said conventionally, 2 km of tunnelling from single face is considered as an achievement but Afcons team executed 3.3 km of tunnelling from a single face that too in just 19 months. This speed was single biggest factor in achieving the tunnel breakthrough targets before time,” Das said. The PKG-14 comprises tunnel works and Afcons till date has completed over 98 per cent of tunnelling. Only 250 meter is balance at Left Hand Side (LHS) tunnel and there too speed is quite good.