Tunneling technology sought for Pune metro: Maha-Metro

The Maharashtra metro is seeking the latest tunnel-boring technology for the five-km underground route of the Pune Metro to drill through the hard ground under a river bed, a top company official has said.
Making a presentation of the Rs 11,420-crore project, which is expected to be completed by 2021, Brijesh Dixit, Managing Director of the Maharashtra Metro Rail Corp. Ltd, expressed confidence of using latest technologies in metro projects in India.
The tunnel will be drilled 30m under the MulaMutha riverbed, through which a section of the project will pass, Dixit said yesterday at the 'Year in Infrastructure 2017' conference here, which was held for the first time in Asia.

A part of the 5-km underground stretch, will be bored through the Deccan plateau basalt strata, which is hard ground and good for drilling tunnels, the Maha-Metro MD said.
"We have learned from more than 200 metro systems operating in global cities as well as in India," he said citing the technologies used in Nagpur metro, which has helped to significantly reduce construction cost and time significantly.
He said more than 50 per cent of the 38-km Nagpur metro, work on which started in 2015, has been completed and is set to meet its December-2019 deadline.
A trial run is underway on a five-km completed section from Khapri to Airport South, he said, adding that financing of the Rs 8,600-crore project has been closed, with over 50 per cent funding from Germany's KfW bank and France's AFD (French Development Agency).