The Central Railway on Sunday dismantled the British-era Carnac Bridge that connected the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) and Masjid Station. The Central Railway had conducted a 27-hour mega traffic block to dismantle the Carnac Bridge.
The traffic block commenced from the night of 19 November, and the dismantle got over just in time for the traffic block that was expected to end on 2am Monday. The block on all suburban and mainline tracks as well the ones in the yard between CSMT and Byculla and CSMT and Wadala was in place from 11pm on Saturday to 2am on Monday.
“However, the first train departed from CSMT for Thane at 3:50pm on Sunday, passing the Carnac Bridge dismantling site at 4pm. Harbour line was restored by 7pm. The work on seventh line and yard are in progress and will be completed before the scheduled plan,” an official said to news agency PTI.
He said removal of pathways in the available corridor margins before the block day and standby cranes helped to complete the work before time.
According to reports, the Main line megablock for Carnac bridge dismantling has ended and train services on the slow and fast corridors have been restarted. The Harbour line services have also been restored more than two hours before schedule.
Central Railway general manager Anil Kumar Lahoti said, “It was a huge and challenging task as traffic on all lines and CSMT stations were completely shut. The extensive preparatory work, innovative and meticulous planning and coordination with local civic bodies enabled us to complete this enormous task ahead of schedule.”
The mega traffic block was also utilised to carry out a large number of other maintenance works involving tracks, overhead equipment (OHE), signalling in shadow block, which saved about 900 hours of future block period for the railways, he added.
The official said helpdesks were set up at various stations and continuous announcements were made about the schedule of express and suburban trains for the convenience of passengers. He said CR appreciated the support of passengers and its counterpart Western Railway for operating suburban trains at full capacity during the weekend as well as civic authorities for running additional number of buses during the block period.
The bridge was built in 1866-67 and was declared unsafe by an expert team of the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IITB) in 2018, though the movement of heavy vehicles on it was stopped in 2014 itself.
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