The Railway Board has approved Rs 527 crore worth funds for Kolkata Metro’s longest corridor ‘New Garia-Airport’. The funds have been approved for modified alignment of its last 3.6 km stretch from City Centre-II to the Airport.

The elevated Metro corridor will now run along the periphery of the airport land parallel to VIP Road before it goes underground to reach the station where it will have an interface with Noapara-Airport Metro. The tender for the work will be opened on 30 July 2020.

A new contractor will now carry out the construction at a faster pace. The Rs 526.6 crore project includes construction of viaduct, ramp and underground RCC box and pushing the box (in cut and cover method), railway yard at the airport and two stations -- Rabi Tirtha and VIP Road.

In another tender floated by the executing agency, Rail Vikas Nigam (RVNL), a Rs 246.9 crore work is being awarded to the contractor for construction of seven stations from New Town (Sub CBD) to Titumir (City Centre II) and a host of civil, mechanical and electrical works.

Earlier, to facilitate construction of the flyover, the state had asked RVNL to take the Metro underground from City Centre II. The original plan was to take the viaduct 500 mtr along an elevated corridor on VIP Road and then take it underground for the final stretch in the airport area.

The proposed flyover will connect VIP Road with Jessore Road through an elevated corridor from Gate 1 on VIP Road with Gate 3 on Jessore Road.