Major Construction Milestone Achieved At Vapi Station, NHSRCL Confirms News24 –
The important structural works at the Vapi station in Gujarat along the 508-km Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail Corridor, popularly termed as bullet train project, are important milestones, with the completion of rail platform level slab casting and structural steel, said the implementing agency.
The National High Speed Rail Corporation Limited (NHSRCL), which is executing the project using Japan’s Shinkansen technology, said roof sheeting and electrical installations were ongoing. In a statement, they added that the station’s approach viaduct towards Ahmedabad is complete, while work with the approach viaduct towards Mumbai is progressing.
According to the NHSRCL, the Vapi station will occupy a built-up area of 28,917 square metres, rise to around 22 metres, and feature services such as a business class lounge. The station is roughly seven km from the Vapi railway junction, 7.5 km from the bus station and five km from an industrial area. It will be one of 12 stations along the bullet train corridor – Mumbai (Bandra Kurla Complex), Thane, Virar, Boisar, Vapi, Bilimora, Surat, Bharuch, Vadodara, Anand/Nadiad, Ahmedabad and Sabarmati.
The first phase of the project covering the 348-km stretch in Gujarat is expected to be operational by 2027. A trial run should take place in early 2026 on a 50-km stretch between Surat and Bilimora, with the arrival of Shinkansen E3 and E5 series train sets from Japan which would operate up to a maximum speed of 320 km per hour.
By 2028, it is anticipated that the entire corridor will be complete and reduce travel times from Mumbai to Ahmedabad significantly, halving them down to less than 3 hours. One service will stop at every station (2 hours 58 minutes), and the other will only stop at select stations (2 hours 07 minutes).
The NHSRCL provided in their latest update that across the project, they have completed 304 km of viaduct and 388 km of pier work. 14 river bridges, seven steel bridges, and five pre-stressed concrete are all complete. There has also been a completion of approximately 163 km of track bed.
The ambitious project sponsored by Japan is experiencing soaring costs and much of the spending is devoted to infrastructure building since the Japan International Cooperation Agency is funding the construction of the high-speed rail line.
In September 2021 Thai Airways reported that the first Shinkansen E5 bullet train that can travel up to 320 km/per hour, will take at least two years to come from Japan, as Indian Railways was in discussions with their Japanese counterparts on the finalization of a timeline on when to supply the trains.
Prime Minister Narenda Modi announced the project three years before starting work in 2020. The project has a length of 545 km which includes Maharashtra (155.76 km), Gujarat (384.04 km) and Dadra and Nagar Haveli (4.3 km) with a completion date originally finalized for 2023. Following protests regarding land acquisition led to insufficient time to complete the project.
In March 2024, the NHSRCL (National High-Speed Rail Corporation Limited) announced that all civil contracts have been awarded in both Gujarat and Maharashtra. The start of construction of the first reinforced concrete track bed for the MAHSR corridor track system in India, which is applicable to the Japanese Shinkansen bullet trains, took place in Surat and Anand. This was the first time the J-slab ballastless track system was employed in India. The NHSRCL stated that it achieved a monumental award winning achievement with the completion of the first 350 metre long and 12.6-metre wide mountain tunnel in Gujarat’s Valsad district within ten months.
The first steel bridge with the 70 metre span and weighing 673 MT has been erected across National Highway 53 in Gujarat’s Surat.
In March 2024, the NHSRCL announced the commencement of the initial work for India’s first seven-kilometre undersea rail tunnel for a 21-km-long tunnel between BKC and Shilphata in Maharashtra. The Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, who had visited Japan last year in order to sort out concerns hampering the project, also announced in February 2024 that a 50km stretch from Surat to Bilimora is to be opened in August 2026.