Mumbai: Quick bridges over troubled lines

Three green Foot-over-Bridges (FOBs) on Mumbai's suburban rail system stand out from the rest – the ones built by the Army's Bombay Engineers Group at Parel-Prabhadevi, Currey Road and Ambivli stations. The Army unburdened the Indian Railways of the task after the stampede on September 29, 2017 that claimed 23 people.

The Army was approached on October 31, and requested to lend their expertise to the building of these three FOBs in the shortest possible span of time. Despite the breach of 90 days, the Army built all three within 117 days at a cost of Rs 18 crore, facilitating foot traffic at the busy stations.

The Bailey bridges – a rapid assembly of pre-fabricated steel parts – were raised as train services continued, under poor soil condition and shortage of land. Bailey bridges are raised during war as temporary structures that can stretch up to a 100 feet.

Bombay Engineers worked in two-hour blocks at night, and enforced only one eight-hour megablock as the project neared completion. The method cut through red tape and set an operating procedure for the Railways to depend on in the future.

The brutal stampede was a harsh wake-up call to the Railways. Western and Central Railways audited all 136 railway stations on the suburban system to find flaws that could endanger lives and set about to rectify them. It added more FOBs, escalators and lifts, and also simplified the project tendering process. Food stalls near FOB landings were also removed, as were benches and unwanted structures from platforms.