TBM Makes 2nd Breakthrough at Delhi Metro’s Bhikaji Cama Place Station
Yesterday afternoon, the S724 Tunnel Boring Machine operated by the Pratibha-FEMC team made a 2nd breakthrough Bhikaji Cama Place station! This was also the final TBM breakthrough for the CC-18 package of Delhi Metro’s 160 km Phase 3 project which spans from the RK Puram ramp to the Lajpat Nagar station’s western shaft, covering a distance of 6.15 km while including 4 underground stations at Bhikaji Cama Place, Sarojini Nagar, INA (interchange with Yellow Line) and South Extension.
This breakthrough was carried out by an EPBM TBM that was commissioned from the RK Puram Ramp/Shaft on March 9 2016 to build the roughly 400m long down-line tunnel of the new 58.59 km Pink line. Had it not been for some PLC issues that rendered the TBM useless for 2 weeks and a salary issue, the breakthrough would have been carried out much earlier in June.
The 1st breakthrough recorded at this station was carried out by TBM S803 for the parallel up-line tunnel in April. View more details and images of that event here.
Note: With this breakthrough, all tunneling work between RK Puram – Bhikaji Cama Place – Sarojini Nagar – INA – South Extension – Lajpat Nagar – Vinobhapuri in south Delhi is now complete!
Satellite view of the Bhikaji Cama Place station’s west shaft where the breakthrough took place:
Alignment of the RK Puram shaft to Bhikaji Cama Place section – view Delhi Metro map & information
Photo Copyright: Nitin Surve
Photo Copyright: Nitin Surve
…and done! Photo Copyright: Niranjan Gupta
Pratibha-FEMC’s jubilant engineers – Photo Copright: Himanshu Arora
Photo Copyright: Sushil Gupta
Here’s a really nice short video with stills & footage covering the entire event:
With this breakthrough out of the way, the action on this line now shifts to package CC-04 in north Delhi and package CC-24 in south Delhi:
Package CC-04 – 4 Breakthroughs
Tunneling work by the 2 ‘rescue’ TBMs launched from Majlis Park towards Rameshwar Nagar has been wrapped up by the CEC-CICI JV. There are now 4 TBMs (2 on either end) facing each other at the Rameshwar Nagar mid-shaft where excavation work is underway to allow the workers to descend, dismantle and bring the TBMs’ parts out one by one. Look out for images on my Twitter handle in the coming months.
Package CC-24 – 2 Breakthroughs
Roughly 200 rings (1 ring=1.4m) are now left to be erected by 2 TBMs operated by the J Kumar – CRTG JV team from the Ashram station towards the Vinobhapuri station. At the start of the month, 475/689 and 458/682 rings had been erected. As I’ve mentioned in the past, this is one of the most painful & financially draining sections of the line due to the tough nature of the terrain. Both pending breakthroughs are expected to take place only in Q4 2016.
For a comprehensive report with a status of all Phase 3 lines’ tunnels, see my July 2016 Tunneling Update.
For more updates, check out the Delhi section of The Metro Rail Guy!
– TMRG
How much time will bridge over yamuna at kalindi kunj will take to complete.
Give it another 2-3 months. The last pier is now ready – see pic.
In which year the construction work for phase 4 will begin.
Earliest it can begin is in 2018. Really depends on when plans are finalized and approved. Long way to go.
When construction for phase 3 was started.
Mid 2011. The 1st ever construction contract (CC-01 from Central Sec to Mandi House) was awarded on May 2, 2011. Ground work began soon after.
now how much time will it take to wrap up this station.
It needs at least another 9 months to be converted into a usable facility. With other sections (Azadpur, Punjabi Bagh & Mayapuri) yet to be built, operations through this station will only be able start in Q4 2017 at the earliest.