Kolkata: Phase 1 of the Kolkata Metro Yellow Line has been completed from Noapara to the Airport.
Once the approval comes from the Commissioner of Railway Safety, this 7 km railway line can start operating commercially.
Now, Phase 2 of the Yellow-like project construction will start. The 18.2km long Yellow Line construction has been divided into three phases.
The completed Phase 1 will be from Noapara to the Airport. The newly started Phase 2 will be from the Airport to New Barrackpur. The Phase 3 will cover New Barrackpur to Barasat.
The entire Yellow Line will have 10 stations — Noapara, Dum Dum Cantonment, Jessore Road, Airport, Birati, Michaelnagar, New Barrackpur, Madhyamgram, Hridaypur and Barasat.
There will be two elevated stations, one at-grade station, and seven underground stations.
Kolkata Metro has now started work on the 1.7 km long line from the Airport to Birati. ITD Cementation has been appointed to create a pair of tunnels for up and down trains in this stretch.
ITD Cementation will also construct subways in the underground Birati station and the subsequent Michael Nagar station.
For this phase two work to start, Kolkata Metro was waiting for some important approvals from the Airport Authority of India.
Now these approvals have come and work has started immediately. This includes the permission to use 18 m cranes in the construction from the Airport to New Barrackpur.
With the Airport area being especially sensitive, even special permission was obtained for tunnel construction between the Airport and Michael Nagar.
In fact, for tunnel construction near the Airport, the box pushing method will be used instead of tunnel boring machines.
In this method, pre-cast reinforced concrete box segments are pushed through the earth to create tunnels.
The Birati station will be built in a cut-and-cover method. This was used in the early 70s when Metro work started in Kolkata.
