First steel bridge of the bullet train project installed in Maharashtra, launched over National Highway-3 at Dive-Anjur

Thane, Sep 29 : A 100-metre-long steel bridge weighing 1,405 metric tonnes has been installed in Maharashtra's Thane district as part of the ambitious Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project, officials said on Tuesday.

This is the first steel bridge to be put in place in Maharashtra under the project. Officials said the structure was fabricated at a workshop in Trichy, Tamil Nadu, carried on trailers over a distance of 1,300 km, and assembled on site before installation.

The bridge, which is 14 metres high and equally wide, was launched over National Highway-3 at Dive-Anjur village in the Bhiwandi area on Monday, according to a release by the National High-Speed Rail Corporation Limited (NHSRCL). With this, 16 of the 28 steel bridges planned along the bullet train corridor have been completed.

Highlighting indigenous technical and material capability under the Make in India initiative, the release said the bridge was built at a specialised workshop in Trichy and then moved by heavy trailers to Thane for on-site assembly.

The launch was a complex operation, carried out with care to ensure structural safety and keep disruption to highway commuters to a minimum, the release said. The structure also features a protective painting system and elastomeric bearings to improve durability and manage vibrations.

An automated system pulled the finished bridge into position during scheduled night-time traffic blocks on the highway, the release added.

The country's first dedicated high-speed rail line, stretching 508 km between Mumbai in Maharashtra and Ahmedabad in Gujarat, is intended to cut travel time between the two cities significantly.

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