In a relief to the Hyderabad Metro Rail project, the Indian Railways has agreed to allow the Metro rail officials to choose the type of girder they want to use (either steel or concrete girders) to cross the railway tracks. The HMR viaducts will cross over the tracks of the Indian Railways at eight railway crossings in the city. The decision was taken during a meeting between officials of the Railway board, South Central Railway and the HMR on Monday.
The additional member (works), Railway Board, Mr A. K. Gupta, who was in Hyderabad, held a meeting with HMR managing director N.V.S. Reddy, senior officials and engineers of HMR, SCR and L&T on a wide variety of technical and safety-related issues of the metro rail project and the interface between HMR and Indian Railways.
Issues related to Metro rail technical parameters, the supportive role of the Railway Board in the safety certification mechanism to be followed by the commissioner of Railway Safety, etc., were discussed at the meeting. Design issues; schedule of dimensions (mandatory static and moving clearances during metro train movement); detailed technical approvals for the designs and drawings of Metro rail viaduct over the tracks of Indian Railways at the eight railway crossings; construction methodology of metro rail crossings, etc., were deliberated.
Mr Gupta inspected the progress of the Metro rail project between Nagole-Mettuguda, Uppal depot works and segment casting at the Uppal casting yard along with N.V.S. Reddy and senior engineers of SCR. As many as 32 foundations and 12 piers (pillars) have been completed so far in this stretch apart from pre-casting of 30 segments.