<p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span lang="EN-US">Mumbai, India’s financial capital, will get additional railway network to serve its teeming millions who take trains to work. Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday (11 October) inaugurated beginning of construction work for two additional elevated metro railway networks.</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">``Metro network is necessary for growing urban areas,’’ said Modi at a ceremony held in Mumbai. ``While many may look at urban growth as a problem, I look at it as an opportunity.’’</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">More than half of Mumbai’s 15 million people use the railway network to commute down and up the triangular Manhattan-shaped island. So far, most of the commuters had to use the almost century old suburban trains, which have been served by creaky coaches overcrowded three to four times their normal capacity.</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">The suburban railway network also witnesses 10-20 people losing their lives every day while crossing tracks due to lack of overhead foot over-bridges or because of falling off overcrowded trains.</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">The modern Metro rail network promises to be safer, cleaner and faster. While most of it is elevated in the city that’s short of land, some parts of the new metro that’s being built, will also have some underground sections.</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span lang="EN-US"> </span><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">Modi also laid foundation stone today to commemorate Babasaheb Ambedkar, who headed the constituent assembly that framed India’s constitution. Of the two Metro corridors one will run from Dahisar in north Mumbai to D N Nagar in northwest Mumbai and the other from Dahisar (East) to Andheri (East).</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) will implement two Metro corridor projects. The 18.5-km Dahisar to D.N.Nagar elevated Metro corridor will have 17 stations and its estimated cost is Rs 4,994 crores and the 16.5-km Dahisar (East) to Andheri (East) elevated Metro corridor which will have 16 stations will cost Rs 4,737 crores.</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="font-size: 12.8px;">Modi also laid the foundation stone for a memorial for Ambedkar in central Mumbai. MMRDA is the special planning authority for the memorial of Ambedkar on 12 acres of Indu Mill Land. The land will also include various facilities such as assembly hall, auditorium, museum, library, landscape gardens, public square, souvenir shops, eateries, administrative offices, staff quarters, and parking area.</span></p><p style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34); font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
