The country's first underwater Metro service from Sealdah to Howrah Maidan
of the Kolkata East-West Metro project will start by the end of 2020.
The Phase I service between Salt Lake Sector V and Phool Bagan will commence in 2018.
This comes after successful completion of tunneling under river Hooghly within record time. The work of tunneling under river Hooghly from Howrah had started on April 14 and two gigantic tunnel boring machines (TBMs) — Prerana and Rachana — had completed the task within just 66 days.
Satish Kumar, Managing Director of Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation Limited (KMRCL), said: "The service in Phase I between Salt Lake Sector V to Phool Bagan will commence in 2018. The rakes will be brought in December 2017.
He further said: "It takes around three years to complete the construction of an underground Metro station. Since we have all the necessary clearances, we can estimate that the work of Phase II that is from Sealdah to Howrah Maidan will be completed by 2020." He said this after releasing a newsletter containing important facts about East-West Metro.
Initially, 14 rakes will be brought in December 2017. The new air-conditioned six-coach trains will run at an average speed of 80 km per hour. The duration between two trains will only be 2 minutes 30 seconds.
"We have been successful in making the water-tight tunnels under river Hooghly within record time. Now the main task is to carry out the work in a busy area like Brabourne Road. Tunneling in a metro city is really challenging," he said adding that all precautions have been taken to ensure protection of the heritage buildings.
"The tunneling work from Howrah Maidan to Howrah Station has been completed and none of the installations including Howrah Station and the oldest one the DRM building received a single crack. Thus, we are confident that none of the buildings including the Beth El synagogue and the Maghen David synagogue will not get affected," he said.
B Dewanjee, Chief Engineer (Civil) of KMRCL, said: "East-West Metro, the existing North-South Metro and the Joka BBD Bag Metro will be intersecting at Esplanade Metro Station.
As per the study the passenger load at Esplanade station would be around 55,000 per hours while in Metro stations at Sealdah and
Howrah stations it would be around 50,000. Besides the entrances on the surface, the subways of the suburban rails will be integrated with that of the Metro railways at Sealdah station."
Unlike the existing North-South Metro service from Kavi Subhas to Noapara, the East West Metro will have facilities to help differently-abled persons to enter a coach of a train on wheelchairs. Moreover, there will be toilets in all the stations.
There will be no chance of anyone falling accidentally or committing suicide by jumping on railway tracks as there will be platform screen doors.