The preliminary works on quadrapuling of the Virar-Dahanu suburban rail line worth Rs 3,555 crore has been approved. This is a significant step as the long-distance trains running on the Mumbai-Delhi route enter bottleneck on the Virar-Dahanu corridor as there are two lines.
The Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation (MRVC) is working on this corridor that will help segregate the long-distance trains from the suburban ones. It is part of the Mumbai Urban Transport Project (MUTP)-3. At present the Western Railway (WR) operates local train services between Churchgate and Dahanu which is a distance of 123kms. There are four lines till Virar which run both slow and fast EMUs on this route.
Beyond Virar, further north, there are only two lines on the entire 63kms stretch that has nine stations between them. "The preliminary works has begun and the actual work will start by end of 2017 or early 2018," said Prabhat Ranjan, Chief PRO, MRVC.
Sources said that as per plans they will now call for tenders. The expansion is expected on the west side of the entire stretch as on the east side, the Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) work is underway.
The railway officials said that as part of adding third and fourth lines between Virar and Dahanu, they are looking at adding eight more stations on this route. Since April 2013, the number of daily commuters on Virar-Dahanu route has gone up from 77,000 to 85,000.
