Mumbai is growing bigger and bigger by the day, in absolute population, population density and in infrastructure. One of the biggest problems for Mumbai is how it will prepare for the next generation. It is currently the 12th biggest city in the world. Some graphs and projections even predict that Mumbai will overtake Tokyo in 2050! Right now Mumbai has the highest population density in the world, in some places you can find 20,000 people and more per square kilometre.
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This video really shows what it is like getting on to the trains in Mumbai. As you watch you can see that some people get on the train as it is moving to beat the rush of peak hour. People are literally running into the train to not get trampled by the crowd. There is really an art to getting in a train at peak hour and this is the daily scene at a Mumbai station. If Mumbai was a person, the most vital organ would be its public transportation. Mumbai relies on cars, buses, and trains. In fact, every day, more than 200 trains make more than 2000 trips and they carry more passengers per kilometre than any other railway system on earth. This leads to extreme overcrowding in trains and buses. The trains were originally built for 1700 passengers, but carry three times that limit! But there is good news! To ease this load Mumbai has now launched the largest public works project in it's history.
In the past three decades, Mumbai's middle class has boomed and that has meant many more cars on the roads. As more people can afford cars, streets are becoming car parks. With the average person needing three parking spots a day, (one at home, one at work and one for wherever else the person had to go) you can see how roads gets congested. With the obvious solution to try to make people use public transport, Mumbai just can't. You have already seen what the trains are like. Due to lack of land there are two options for Mumbai; put roads in the sky or put roads over the water. The key project to address this is the new sea-link called the Bandra-Worli Cable Bridge. It was built to divert traffic off the main roads. With the bridge being 5.8 km long and 340,000 tons Mumbai hopes it will become a tourist attraction. The sea-link reduces travel time between Bandra and Worli during peak hours from 60–90 minutes to 20–30 minutes. All eight lanes were opened on 24 March 2010.
This video really shows what it is like getting on to the trains in Mumbai. As you watch you can see that some people get on the train as it is moving to beat the rush of peak hour. People are literally running into the train to not get trampled by the crowd. There is really an art to getting in a train at peak hour and this is the daily scene at a Mumbai station. If Mumbai was a person, the most vital organ would be its public transportation. Mumbai relies on cars, buses, and trains. In fact, every day, more than 200 trains make more than 2000 trips and they carry more passengers per kilometre than any other railway system on earth. This leads to extreme overcrowding in trains and buses. The trains were originally built for 1700 passengers, but carry three times that limit! But there is good news! To ease this load Mumbai has now launched the largest public works project in it's history.
In the past three decades, Mumbai's middle class has boomed and that has meant many more cars on the roads. As more people can afford cars, streets are becoming car parks. With the average person needing three parking spots a day, (one at home, one at work and one for wherever else the person had to go) you can see how roads gets congested. With the obvious solution to try to make people use public transport, Mumbai just can't. You have already seen what the trains are like. Due to lack of land there are two options for Mumbai; put roads in the sky or put roads over the water. The key project to address this is the new sea-link called the Bandra-Worli Cable Bridge. It was built to divert traffic off the main roads. With the bridge being 5.8 km long and 340,000 tons Mumbai hopes it will become a tourist attraction. The sea-link reduces travel time between Bandra and Worli during peak hours from 60–90 minutes to 20–30 minutes. All eight lanes were opened on 24 March 2010.
The second part of this project is connecting Mumbai east to west and west to east. Right now Mumbai only has trains going from north to south and south to north. With the congestion and danger of trying to cross over the railway lines that go north and south in this mega city, they are now making some of the crossings much safer. The solution is a road over the tracks. Patel Engineering Ltd was contracted to build a six lane highway called the Santa Cruz-Chembur Link Road (shortened to SCLR). Due to the lack of land this project was made in the sky. This road will also be the first double-Decker highway in India. This literally means a highway on top of another highway for 1.8 km. This is a road that really does rival the sea-link. To even support the weight of this road it has it foundation sunk 90 metres into the ground. The highway reached a total length of 6.45 km all in the air! This project was also named the worlds most delayed road project. The project was meant to be commence in 2003, but only began only in 2007. The main problem for this highway was the slums below. More than 60% of Mumbai lives in slums and lots of people living in illegal government land was a major problem. This documentary by National Geographic explain the situation for the people in the slums well. I uploaded it onto YouTube. So here it is if you want to find it on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYrnrITCLVw
As mentioned on the video, this construction will force 4000 people to have to leave their homes for this new highway. The SCLR was opened to the public on 18 April 2014. The project missed 12 deadlines since the original deadline of November 2004. The delay in the project was mainly due to rehabilitation and resettlement related works. The maximum speed limit for all vehicles is 30 kilometres per hour.