WR starts rebuilding Delisle bridge; to hold night blocks for work
After shutting Delisle bridge, next to Lower Parel station, for nearly 15 months, Western Railway (WR) has started work on rebuilding the bridge. Delisle bridge is a crucial east-west connector for the newly-developed business hub in the Lower Parel-Elphinstone belt.

Once it’s rebuilt, the bridge will reduce travel time for motorists, who have been taking detours via Elphinstone bridge or Mahalaxmi bridge, and ease traffic congestion.
Ravinder Bhakar, chief spokesperson of WR, said the construction wing has begun the work and will take at least nine months to finish it.
The zonal railway also said it will be conducting four-hour-long blocks on the Dadar-bound slow line at night for 40 days to complete work on the bridge. The block will start at 1.25am and end at 5.25am.
Owing to the work, five early morning locals will be operated via the down fast line, and four local services starting from Mahalaxmi car shed will be cancelled.
Bhakar said that they will need to conduct some more blocks in future for speedy completion of the bridge. “We have already received all necessary permissions for the work and the contract has been allotted,” he said.
According to WR officials, the estimated cost of rebuilding the bridge is ₹86.52 crore. The bridge will be 85-metre long.
Before razing the colonial-era bridge built in 1921, WR had shut it for all kinds of traffic from July 24, 2018. The decision to shut and rebuild the bridge was taken on the basis of a safety audit conducted by the Indian Institute of Technology, which had declared it unsafe. The audit was undertaken after a part of Gokhale bridge in Andheri collapsed on July 3, 2018.
To make way for a new bridge, authorities have relocated some people staying underneath it, along with 173 shopkeepers, including fish sellers.