Bridge No 44 over Brahmaputra river at Bogibeel stands tall against the blue sky of December (@RailNf/Twitter)India’s longest rail-cum-road which will be inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday (25 December) is said to have a lifespan of over 120 years, officials say.
The Bogibeel Bridge on Brahmaputra river is 4.9 km long and is the only bridge in India that is fully welded, which will save a lot of cost on maintenance. The project is said to have cost the exchequer Rs 5,900 crore, chief engineer Mohinder Singh told Hindustan Times.
The time spent on travelling between Assam and Arunachal Pradesh will be shortened by four hours. The Delhi to Dibrugarh train-travel time will also be cut short by three hours. The bridge was a brainchild of former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee. On the bridge lies a two-line railway track and a three-lane road on the two decks.
The floods in Brahmaputra delayed the work a bit. Hindustan Times quoted Singh as saying, “Eighty-thousand tonnes of steel plates were delivered for the project via a combination of rail and road transport, while a 1,000-tonne hydraulic jack and strand jacks linked with the substructures were used for moving steel truss over the pillars.”
An Appeal...
Dear Reader,
As you are no doubt aware, Swarajya is a media product that is directly dependent on support from its readers in the form of subscriptions. We do not have the muscle and backing of a large media conglomerate nor are we playing for the large advertisement sweep-stake.
Our business model is you and your subscription. And in challenging times like these, we need your support now more than ever.
We deliver over 10 - 15 high quality articles with expert insights and views. From 7AM in the morning to 10PM late night we operate to ensure you, the reader, get to see what is just right.
Becoming a Patron or a subscriber for as little as Rs 1200/year is the best way you can support our efforts.