Sea-Link, Connecting the upper Mumbai..

June 30th, A dream come true for almost every mumbaikars. The site which was a shooting point for almost every mumbai based movie. We could have seen the progression from RBGG (Raju Ban gaya Gentleman) to JTYJN (Jaane Tu ya Jaane na). Mumbai has almost become NOKIA (Connecting people)., But to let u know.. "Nothing on this earth comes for free..."

This is an amazing stretch, But this is the stretch without halt, You cannot halt on the bridge! Amazingly the toll is Rs. 50 / side, which is quite fine looking at the mumbai traffic and moreover when the bridge boasts of having covering the 40 minutes (8 kms) stretch in 7 minutes (5.6 Kms). The bridge is however not open to 2 wheelers, 3 wheelers and trucks. So in short, only cars and buses can take this path.

Lets calculate a little, based on a small car that we may use for travelling.
Alto (Mileage of Avg 16 Km/litre, 5.6 x 2 = 11.2 kms (two ways) which is less than 1 lt of petrol, hardly, Rs. 40 twoways + Rs. 100 2 way toll makes it Rs. 140. Monthly Expense Approx Rs. 3080)

Alto (Mileage of Avg 16 Km/litre, 8x 2 = 16 kms (two ways) which equal to 1 lt of petrol, hardly, Rs. 48 twoways + Rs. 0 toll makes it Rs. 48. Monthly Expense Rs. 1056.)

All that you can do is save time at the expense of Rs. 2000, which could be used for partying, again spent from pocket.

Look from the other prespective, the governments eye. They expect a 1,20,000 vehicles using this road daily, Out of which they'd be expecting a crowd of 80K to be using this road daily, which makes it average 80K x 50 = Rs. 4000K. That makes it 40 Lakhs daily. From the above calculations, seems like Goverment would be able to recover the total expindeture in less than 12 years apart from maintenance of the bridge.

With the fuel price already hiked by Rs. 4 and bikers not allowed on the bridge, i hope our government manages to pull it out or else, it would be once again the government coming down hard on the pockets of us tax payers. Meanwhile, there is something to cheer about for Mr. Rajendra Chauhan. He was the first and hopefully the last biker to be using the bridge., Catch him up here.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOn68B5Tqjc&feature=channel

In the meanwhile, This blog owner has started looking out for a 2nd hand car in mumbai or a rich gal from mumbai, who can gift the blog owner a car and also afford to have Rs. 150 (for toll and fuel) in her wallet..

Do wave to me if you see me on the bridge of fortune....