Bengaluru: While Namma Metro has continuously missed deadlines and the Tunnel Boring Machines (TBM) too have been facing problems, the year 2015 might turn out to be a significant one in the history of Bangalore metro.
The authority is looking to commission four stretches in this year namely Reach 3b, Reach 2 and East- West and North-South Corridors.
Metro has been at the receiving end from various sections for its delays in completion of Phase 1, now the department is trying to leave no stone unturned to complete the phase by this year end.
Speaking with Deccan Chronicle Vasanth Rao, General Manger (Finance) from BMRCL says, “In the next two months Reach 3b (Peeny Industry to Nagasandra) will be ready for commercial purpose, this will be followed by Reach 2 (Leprosy Hospital to Mysuru Road) in June or July.
During the same period East-West corridor (Baiyappanahalli to Mysuru Road) should be ready and open for operations. Then by December end the North-South Corridor (Nagasandra to Puttenahalli) should be operational as well.”
Sources say in another 3-4 months Majestic interchange station, Chickpet and KR Market station will be completed. Vasanth Rao further added, “Although we are pushing ourselves to complete everything by September but the deadline that we are working towards is December 2015.
With underground portion it is quite unpredictable. When you are working 60 feet below the ground, you are bound to encounter uncertain problems.
It is a hard rock or soft soil, it is not a problem. But the challenge is when you have to face intermediate rock which is a mix of both hard rock and soft soil.”
Currently, four Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) namely Krishna, Kaveri, Godaveri and Margarita have been put to work in the underground section of namma metro.
Last year TBM Margarita and Helen had successfully finished majority of tunneling work in East-West Corridor and it is North-South Corridor that is posing major hurdle for the BMRCL especially from Sampige to National College.
While TBM Godavari broke down between Sampige and Majestic after hitting a rock and took months for repair, in October 2014, Kaveri achieved a break through from City Market to Chikpet. Sources, Kaveri TBM will now run from Chickpet to Majestic however the assembling was delayed by two weeks for unknown reasons.
