Tech hub to mass-transit interface

Salt Lake: Technology nerve centre Sector V could emerge as a Metro motherboard with parallel lines of the East-West and New Garia-Airport links converging there. Both routes will eventually extend to the airport.

The two stations are on either side of the Salt Lake Bypass in front of Wipro building. Railway officials said a foot overbridge connecting the concourses of both stations will be built a little over six metres above the road.

"The two Sector V stations will comprise a mass-transit hub providing seamless connectivity from areas along the Bypass to Howrah," a senior railway official said.

The stations will have two levels each - the concourse and the platform area above it. The concourses will be more than six metres above the ground while the platforms are to have double that elevation.

Officials said escalators and elevators were being planned at both stations along with a walkalator connecting them to the foot overbridge. "Passengers needing to shift from one line to another won't cross the road, they will use the foot overbridge," the official said.

The proposed features of the passenger interface will be discussed soon at a meeting between the implementing agencies for the East-West and New Garia-Airport links.

In the first phase, the New Garia-Airport Metro will link New Garia with Ruby station. "In the second phase, we are planning to run trains till Sector V, which will then become the terminal station," said an official of the Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd (RVNL), the implementing agency for the project.

The Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation is building the East-West link.

Land-acquisition challenges at Mahisbathan in Salt Lake have forced the railways to divide the New Garia-Airport project into three phases. There are seven buildings in the way of the Metro route at Mahisbathan. The state government has agreed to demolish the buildings based on an understanding that the railways will pay compensation. But this process has delayed the third phase of the project and also affected the construction of the Sector V station, officials said.

"The pile foundation for the station has been completed. We weren't sure whether the route alignment would change, so we had initially left out the task of shifting underground utilities from the scope of work. But that part of the job is now almost complete and the station is likely to be ready in one-and-a-half years," said an official of RVNL.

The East-West Metro station in Sector V is also almost ready. This corridor will connect Sector V with Howrah Maidan, the route including underground and overground stretches as well as a section under the Hooghly.

The first phase of the East-West Metro is scheduled to become operational in June. The plan is to run trains between Sector V and the Stadium station until Sealdah is ready.

Railway officials said they were expecting a footfall of more than three lakh daily at the twin Sector V stations by 2035.

Studies conducted by the two service providers show that the New Garia-Airport station will handle more than a lakh passengers every day while the East-West station will have nearly double that footfall on an average.

The actual numbers could be even higher than the projected figures, officials said.