GHAZIABAD: The elevated corridor of the entire Red Line extension in Ghaziabad was built in intensive four-hour night shifts, two girders per shift, 365 days in a row.The viaduct that brings the metro to New Bus Adda from Dilshad Garden crosses the busiest road in Ghaziabad — GT Road. A total of 695 girders were put up across the stretch in a year, followed by another 135 days that went into putting up pier cap on the pillars. Engineers and workers of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) spent a total of 500 nights on the job.The reason for this, said Delhi Metro spokesperson Anuj Dayal, was the unusually heavy flow of traffic on GT Road, over which the metro corridor passes. “A vehicular survey before we started the project showed that the traffic volume was extremely high along the road,” said Dayal.With such a high volume of traffic, diversions seemed to be the only option. “But even that was difficult as there was little space along the alignment where we could divert the traffic. The heavy work, therefore, was assigned to be done during the night,” added the Delhi Metro official.However, even during the night, there were restrictions. The only window available to close down the road and finish work on the alignment was between midnight and 5.30am. “Essentially, we had only four hours to work with, as the cranes carrying the girders would need to be brought to the site and then taken out,” explained Dayal.The work to be done had to be precise and done as efficiently as possible, and the deadline could not be stretched, said Dayal, due to the heavy use of the road. Each girder weighs 168 tonnes, with two being carried by specialised cranes to the site every night. The cranes themselves weighed more than 500 tonnes.“We ensured that each night, at least two girders would be deployed. In total, 695 girders were deployed, with 40 girders being put up at the Hindon River station and approach corridor,” said Dayal. During the peak construction period, over a thousand workers were at the site, he added.The Dilshad Garden-New Bus Adda section is set to become operational later this year. It has eight stations, with the Mohan Nagar station likely to be an interchange with the Blue Line when the proposed Vaishali-Mohan Nagar section is built.

Stay updated with all the Ghaziabad Latest News headlines here. For more exclusive & live news updates from all around India, stay connected with NYOOOZ.