RailEnquiry

The prime minister’s office has laid down deadlines for city rail projects like the Churchgate-Virar elevated railway and the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train.

The Churchgate-Virar elevated railway project, which will run air-conditioned local trains with an investment of Rs20,000 crore, will be finalised before March 2013 along with tenders for the Navi Mumbai airport project.

“The support agreement with the state government that will help us sort out issues like shifting utilities, rehabilitation, land at the ground level to begin field work will be established in two weeks,’’ WR spokesperson Sharat Chandrayan said.

Another official said that the consultants for financial and legal aspects would be appointed soon. WR will commercially exploit land at eight locations to generate funds. Numbers of structures that come in the way for Churchgate-Virar project have already been listed out.

The PM’s meet also decided to finalise the 500-km high-speed corridor from Mumbai to Ahmedabad, which will cost about Rs 60,000 crore and will reduce the travel time to four hours.