India's first underwater metro line

According to the Times of India, the Howrah Maidan-Esplanade metro section, which crosses a large river called Hooghly, is considered an important milestone in India's infrastructure development.

The stretch connecting Howrah Maidan and Esplanade is 4.8km long, of which the 520m section that travels under the Hooghly River takes just 45 seconds to cross.

Work on the tunnel under the river began in 2017. The project is considered to have excellent engineering, demonstrating technological capacity in the construction process.

Furthermore, the project is not just a means of transportation, but also a solution to the long-standing problems of traffic congestion and air pollution in the capital city of Kolkata (West Bengal), thereby promising a more sustainable and efficient urban environment.

Not only is it the first tunnel under a major river in India, the Howrah metro station is also the deepest tunnel in the country (30m).

Notably, the train is managed by an automatic train operation (ATO) system, which helps the train automatically move to the next station with just a push of a button.

The train completed testing on the Hooghly River in April 2023 and officially carried passengers on March 7.

According to local authorities, only 27.99 km of metro network was operational in Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal, from its inception in 1984 to 2014. After 2014, the network was expanded by 25.34 km, starting with the inauguration of the first phase of the East-West Metro from Salt Lake V to Salt Lake Stadium, a 5.3 km stretch, in 2020.

Gradually, the Kolkata Metro system is expanding further. The period 2022-23 has recorded the highest ever expansion of the Metro network in Kolkata at 14.23 km in a year, adding 36% to the existing network since the inception of Kolkata Metro.

The Kolkata Metro network currently stretches 47.93 km, comprising 32.13 km of the North-South corridor, 9.3 km of the East-West corridor and 6.5 km of the Joka-Esplanade corridor. An extension of 13.27 km is also planned.

Minh Hoa (reported by Tuoi Tre, VTV)

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