Pune Metro’s Underground NATM Siding Line Takes Shape
A 185 meter underground siding line tunnel has started to take shape roughly 24 meters at the bottom of the Swargate Station on Pune Metro’s under construction 16.589 km Purple Line which’ll connect Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC) and Swargate through 14 stations.
This siding line cavern at the station’s southern-end is being built using the New Austrian Tunnelling Method (NATM) by Gülermak – Tata Projects Limited JV which is responsible for the 2.74 km Package UGC-02 of the underground line from Swargate to Budhwar Peth Station. They are being assisted by a Detailed Design Consultant (DDC) team from Geoconsult India – Tandon Consultants (GC-TCPL) JV.
It consists of 2 sections – a 160 meter section for the actual siding line to stable and reverse trains, and a 25 meter long buffer stop to prevent trains from crashing into the end of the tunnel. If and when the line is extended to Katraj, it will be done through these very tunnels.
The first controlled NATM blast took place in April. Here’s a rare video I tweeted out last week:
Some images, shot at different times, shared by MahaMetro earlier this week:
The station shaft here was built by J Kumar Infraprojects and parts of Terratec’s third tunnel boring machine for Pune, (TBM) S-81, are still stored adjacent to the site, roughly 5 months after arriving from China due to a labor shortage from the nationwide and locally imposed lock-down.
For more updates, check out the Pune section of The Metro Rail Guy!
– TMRG
Very good article, It would be appreciated if we include DDC ‘Geoconsult-TCPL JV’ in the article.
Thanks – Done!
The siding line is at the same level as the platforms or lower, I am a bit confused !