Despite spending Rs 425 crore last year on various road improvement initiatives, the civic body has set aside around Rs 275 crore for road works, mostly aimed at filling potholes during the monsoon. This ongoing issue raises concerns about when Mumbaikars will finally experience a smoother, pothole-free commute.
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), responsible for maintaining approximately 2,050 kilometers of roads, has taken up road concretisation work. Of the total 2,050 km of roads, around 1,000 km were already concretised by 2022. The civic body undertook the concretisation of an additional 210 km in January 2022 and later sanctioned another proposal for 397 km of roads in February 2023, costing Rs 6,080 crore.
However, due to inadequate planning, hardly 25 percent of the work has been completed before the onset of the monsoon, leaving many roads marred by potholes.
Last year, in a bid to ensure pothole-free roads before the monsoon, the municipal corporation allocated Rs 225 crore for repairs and an additional Rs 200 crore for mastic asphalt resurfacing, totaling Rs 425 crore. This year, another Rs 275 crore is being spent on similar efforts. This means that around Rs 700 crore will be spent in two years to address the issue of potholes. Despite these substantial expenditures, the roads remain in poor condition.
To address potholes during the monsoon, the civic body has appointed 14 contractors across seven zones—two per zone. One contractor handles roads less than 9 meters wide at the local ward level, while the other manages roads wider than 9 meters under the road department's jurisdiction. Each division office has been allocated ₹10 crore for repairs on roads wider than 9 meters and about Rs 1.5 crore for those narrower than 9 meters. Overall, approximately Rs 275 crore is being spent specifically on improving potholes and bad roads.
Currently, there are 24 ongoing road projects in the city, 32 in the eastern suburbs, and 87 in the western suburbs. Mumbaikars remain hopeful that these efforts will eventually lead to smoother and safer commutes.