Mumbai, Dec. Dec 21 (IANS): The ambitious 8-lane Mumbai Coastal Road project is now 17 per cent complete on the southern side from Marine Drive to Worli and the sector is expected to be operational by July 2023, BMC Municipal Commissioner I.S. Chahal said here on Monday.

"Substantial work has been done in the past couple of months spending Rs 1,281-crore till November, and about 17 percent work of the project is completed," Chahal told IANS.

The work, which proceeded in full swing during the lockdown months last summer and monsoon, involved reclaiming 175 acres land from the Arabian Sea with another 102 acres currently being reclaimed, he added.

A highlight of the project will be a 400-metre long and 39.60 feet diameter tunnel boring machine (TBM), which has been fully assembled, said Chahal.

It will now be deployed for tunneling work on the Girgaum Chowpatty-Malabar Hill sector for a 3.40km long double-tunnel, starting from January 7, 2021.

The Rs 12,721-crore CRP, when fully completed, will connect Churchgate on the southern tip with Kandivali in the northwest tip of the city, which will allow vehicles to zoom at higher speeds, significantly slashing the travel time between the two points, and also the Mumbai Airport.

Planned as an 8-lane road, running 29.20 kms hugging the west coast of Mumbai, the BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation's prestigious project was commenced in October 2018 with a completion target of 2022, but got delayed owing to litigations.

The work halted in July 2019 when the Bombay High Court quashed the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) clearances given to CRP and resumed after the Supreme Court stayed the HC order in Dec. 2019.