Mumbai: Following PM Narendra Modi’s announcement in Japan to run bullet trains across 7,000 km in India, we not only conducted a reality check on the Bullet Train project, the most ambitious project underway, but also spoke with Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw about it. Responding to our questions, he said that the bullet train will not only start running from next year, but we have also achieved many things through this project. One of these is the full-span launching technology, which launches thousands of tons of steel girders. We are now also going to export this technology.
Furthermore, Vaishnaw made a major announcement that bullet train travel will also be available to the middle class. Its fares will be reasonable and affordable for middle-class travelers. The Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Corridor will be fully completed by 2029. The bullet train will operate in three phases, with the first phase running from Bili Mora to Surat in 2027. The second phase will reach Thane Creek in 2028, and the third phase will reach Mumbai’s BKC in 2029.
Initially, During peak hours, the bullet train will run every half an hour, and later, during peak hours, it will run every 10 minutes.
Regarding rolling stock, India has signed a contract with Japan for the state-of the-art E10 series Shinkansen coaches. This means that Indians will travel on the E10 Shinkansen series bullet trains, which can have 10 to 16 coaches.
Furthermore, Vaishnaw attacked Uddhav Thackeray over the delay in the bullet train project, saying that Thackeray had caused a 2.5 year delay in the project, but that work is now progressing rapidly in Maharashtra. On Saturday, a 5-kilometer tunnel between Ghansoli and Silphata was broken through, part of a 21-kilo meter tunnel in Maharashtra. The remaining 16 kilo meters will be a single-tube tunnel with double tracks, including a 7-kilometer tunnel built 18 meters below sea level.
Furthermore, the Mumbai bullet train station has a capacity of 30,000 passengers per day, exceeding Japan’s “Ueno Bullet Station.” The Ueno station is a roadside station, while the Mumbai station is a terminal station, with separate towers rising 95 meters above the station.
This isn’t the only bullet train project; work is underway on the East, North, and South bullet train corridors in the country. If we talk about the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train Project, out of the 508 km distance from Gujarat to Mumbai, 321 km of viaducts, 398 km of piers, 17 river bridges, and 9 steel bridges have been completed. Over 4 lakh noise barriers and 206 km of track bed have been completed on the 206 km long route. Furthermore, work on building 7 mountain tunnels in the Palghar area is also progressing rapidly.
This bullet train corridor will have 12 stations, of which 8 will be in Gujarat and 4 in Maharashtra.
