The British-era reservoir under Mohammad Ali Park, which had caved in in 2019, will not be restored until a fresh health assessment of the structure is carried out.
The Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) will set up a reservoir-cum-booster pumping station at Marcus Square, near the College Street market.
Once the partly underground reservoir-cum-pumping station at Marcus Square is ready, the civic body will stop using the brick reservoir under Mohammad Ali Park.
It will be emptied and a fresh health assessment of the structure will be made before a decision is taken on whether it could be repaired or dismantled and built afresh.
The Marcus Square facility will cost Rs 42 crore and will be ready in 30 months, KMC officials said.
A portion of a wall of the reservoir under Mohammad Ali Park collapsed in 2019. An inspection by engineers of the KMC and professors at Jadavpur University revealed large cracks in the reservoir.
The park has remained closed to visitors since. A landmark Durga Puja, which was traditionally held in the heart of the park, was relocated to a corner of the ground that was deemed safe by engineers.
The Marcus Square project was approved at a special session of the civic house of the KMC on Monday.
“We have selected a company for the Marcus Square project through competitive bidding. The approval by the civic house has paved the way for staring the construction of the reservoir-cum-booster pumping station,” a KMC official said.
Sources in the KMC said the reservoir under Mohammad Ali Park has been functioning at a reduced capacity since the collapse of the wall.
“Since the reservoir cannot be filled to capacity, the supply is being affected in the command zone of the reservoir, which includes large parts of central Kolkata. Many homes are getting less than the usual quota of water,” an official said.
“The problem cannot be solved unless we build a reservoir of equal capacity that functions at its optimum.”
The original capacity of the reservoir under Mohammad Ali Park is 3 million gallon. The one at Marcus Square will store 4 million gallons of water.
The Mohammad Ali Park reservoir, which was constructed before Independence, and the booster pumping station at the park receive water from the tank in Tallah in north Kolkata.
Because of the long distance between Mohammad Ali Park and Tallah, the water pressure drops in the underground pipelines.
The booster pumping station was constructed at the park to increase the pressure. Large parts of Burrabazar and Mechua receive water from the booster pumping station at Mohammad Ali Park.
The committee of experts formed to inspect the Mohammad Ali Park reservoir had advised the removal of a 1ft layer of soil from the entire park to reduce the load on the brick reservoir.
The engineers were of the opinion that the addition of layers of soil over the years, for beautification or other projects, increased the weight on the reservoir and contributed to the collapse of the wall.
