Through Aarey,
Environmentalists say project will hit green cover, BMC promises it won’t
MUMBAI: The Aarey Milk Colonysanjay Gandhi National Park belt—a rare green patch in the suburbs that is already under the threat of land sharks — may soon have a six-lane road passing through it.
To construct the city’s fifth east-west connecting link, the Goregaon-mulund Link Road (GMLR), the civic body is planning to widen an existing road in the Aarey Colony, causing environmentalists see red.
The 7-km Aarey colony road from the western express highway to Saki Vihar will be a part of the 16-km GMLR. The stretch through Aarey will link to a 9-km elevated road from Saki Vihar going through the pipeline road to beyond LBS in Mulund.
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), which is about to start the tendering process for the project, has assured that no trees would be cut for road-widening project and that some trees will be uprooted, but transplanted in the same area. “We are also planning the project in a way that animal movements are not restricted,” said SVR Srinivas, additional municipal commissioner.
Activists, however, have said the project would badly affect the green cover in the area. “The survival rate of trees transplanted is low, they need high maintenance,
which the authorities fail to undertake. Also, the authorities have failed to compete the transplantation of trees hacked during the building of the Jogeshwarivikhroli Link Road, claiming the contract has expired,” said Biju Augustine, an environmentalist.
Several leopards have also made their home in the area, shielded by the bushes, and activists fear that widening the road could put them
in danger of coming in the way of speeding cars and restricting their movement.
“The government has planned to construct a Metro 2 yard and a zoo in the colony. Feasibility
studies of all the projects are required before any such projects start,” said Nitin Kubal, convener, Hamara Shehar, Hamara Vikas, Hamara Niyojan, Abhiyan, Mumbai.