FCC

3 Bidders for Mumbai’s Goregaon – Mulund Link Road Tunnel Project

2023-07-01

Afcons Infrastructure, Larsen & Toubro, NCC – J Kumar Infraprojects JV submitted bids for constructing 4.7 km twin tunnels of the 12.20 km Goregaon-Mulund Link Road (GMLR) project.

Alignment of GMLR and its tunnels (Phase 3 in Blue) via BMC’s tender docs

The Goregaon-Mulund Link Road (GMLR) is a proposed 12-km-long east-west connector in Mumbai, India. It will connect the Western Express Highway (WEH) at Goregaon to the Eastern Express Highway (EEH) at Mulund. The project is being implemented in four phases:

Phase 1: Construction of the Nahur Road overbridge, which is 70% complete and is likely to be completed by May 2023.
Phase 2: Road widening work at Goregaon East and Mulund West, which is 65% complete.
Phase 3: Construction of flyovers on both sides of the WEH and EEH, and a box and twin tunnels at Goregaon East.
Phase 4: Construction of the remaining road sections and ancillary works.

The project will be built using 2 mega tunnel boring machines (TBMs) with a diameter of around 13m and the cut and cover (C&C) method will be utilized for constructing a 1.6 km box-tunnel near Film City.

In January 2020, the BMC floated two separate tenders for creating the tunnels. The tenders were for the construction of a twin tunnel and a box tunnel.

In September 2022, the BMC scrapped the two tenders due to technical reasons.

In June 2023, the BMC floated fresh tenders for building the tunnels. The deadline for submitting bids for the fresh tenders is July 25, 2023.

The BMC is currently evaluating the bids that have been submitted for the fresh tenders. The BMC is expected to announce the successful bidder in the coming weeks.

The project is being undertaken by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and is expected to cost ₹10,100.91 crore (US$1.3 billion).

Preliminary design rendering prepared by PADECO

The GMLR will consist of two tunnels, one 4.7 kilometers (2.9 miles) long and the other 1.6 kilometers (1 mile) long. The tunnels will run beneath the Sanjay Gandhi National Park (SGNP) and Goregaon Film City, respectively. The remaining 6 kilometers (3.7 miles) of the road will be elevated via two six-lane flyovers. The road will be widened by over 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) to ensure smooth traffic movement.

The GMLR is expected to reduce the travel time between Mulund and Goregaon from 75 minutes to 20 minutes. It will also decongest the existing roads in the area, such as the WEH, EEH, and the LBS Marg.