With the September 29 stampede highlighting the need for a foot overbridge (FOB), the Army on Thursday started work on a temporary bridge at Elphinstone Road station.
The FOB will be built on the north-end of the station and will connect to Parel on the central railway (CR). The work is expected to be completed by the end of January and the railways plan to throw it open to public in February.
While the railways’ process to build an FOB is time-consuming, a temporary bridge can be built within a fixed time-frame, which is why the Army was given the job. The FOB is termed temporary, as it can be dismantled if the railways wish to.
Currently, the Army is marking the area, digging and assembling raw material for the work. Once the construction begins, the western railway (WR) will soon impose blocks at night, other than Sundays.
As the work on Parel terminus and another FOB has started, the railways are looking for space for the Army to keep the raw material that will needed for the work.
An Army officer working on the FOB said usually they can build such a bridge within five to six days. “At Elphinstone Road, we will get only limited hours of work a day owing to rail traffic, high-voltage overhead wires and constant movements of trains. If we get complete access, the work can be completed within a week.”
The WR will impose four-hour blocks at night and dedicated Sunday blocks to help the Army complete the work at the earliest. “Once we get a letter from the Army, we will announce the blocks,” said a WR official.
The Army has also started the initial work at Ambivli station and will soon move to Currey Road station on the central railway. The Pune-based wing of the Indian Army Corps of Engineers (IACOE) will coordinate with the railways to build the FOB. The IACOE helps in constructing bridges during emergency, including natural calamities.