11 September,2020 07:01 AM IST | Mumbai | Rajendra B Aklekar
Bhiwandi Road railway station
Known as a major hub of warehouses for almost all the retailers and online shopping websites, Bhiwandi is also a troubled zone with inter-state heavy vehicle traffic and poor roads, affecting the motorists. But the commuters taking the busy Bhiwandi-Kalyan road finally have some hope.
Thousands of trucks, lorries and trailers along the stretch will soon be off the roads, as the first cargo train was brought to the major rail parcel terminus at Bhiwandi for loading on Wednesday. The terminus was opened a month ago.
Bhiwandi is also famous for power looms and textile by-products, and the newly developed goods shed is slated for sending textile products on the first run.
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"The Bhiwandi and Mumbra roads have been the worst. Anybody will vouch for that. Roads are fixed but they are again damaged, probably because of the heavy vehicle traffic. This leaves motorists and other travellers on the stretch frustrated," Kasim Shaikh, who takes the route to work every day.
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Local MP Kapil Patil said he had requested the Ministry of Railways to set up the parcel hub at Bhiwandi to ease pressure on the road network.
"This corner outside Mumbai has been the hub for retailers and online warehouses, and Bhiwandi has also been generating jobs during the lockdown. According to a recent report, Bhiwandi has some of India's largest warehouses together measuring about 25.7 million sqft," a businessman said.
"The warehouses are mainly concentrated on Old Agra Road and the NH-3 (Mumbai-Nashik highway). There are residential clusters as well, leading to traffic congestion and hence, this train parcel terminus is getting popularity and help," another resident said.
Teams from newly set up Business Development Units (BDUs) of Central Railway's Mumbai division, during the lockdown, aggressively marketed new proposals, taking into consideration schemes and suggestions submitted by different freight aggregators, new customers, trade bodies and logistics companies.
"These initiatives by the BDUs yielded many new traffic and bridged a bond with trade and industry for new business," a senior divisional official said.
CR chief public relations officer Shivaji Sutar confirmed that the first train has been placed for loading today at Bhiwandi.
Bhiwandi is known as the Manchester of Mumbai due to the conglomeration of various business hubs and the railways hopes to capture all the business here. Once that happens, road traffic will obviously come down, Central Railway Mumbai Divisional Railway Manager Shalabh Goel said.
The first parcel train with five parcel vans fully loaded with various commodities like refrigerators, furniture, medicines, cosmetic goods, etc, has been loaded from Bhiwandi Road station, Maharashtra to Danapur in Bihar on September 9. Approximately 115 tonnes of parcels were loaded resulting earnings of R4,13,928. The parcel vans will be attached to Kisan Rail at Devlali station for onward journey to Danapur (Patna).
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