The Mumbai Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport's new Terminal 2, which opened for operations yesterday, has been built at the cost Rs 12,500 crore.
The T2 terminal offers passengers "an experience that’s at par with the best in the world", its website says. This includes "premium and high-end fashion and accessories" stores in 21,000 square meters of retail space; 6,000 pieces of Indian art from the sixth century through the 19th century in the corridors; and 5,000 square metres of landscaped areas.
Should they feel the need to go, the 40 million passengers who will use the terminal each year can pop into one of the facility's 101 toilet complexes, each featuring multiple stalls.
By contrast, the 3.75 million Mumbai suburban rail passengers who pass through the iconic Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus downtown each day have access to only 83 individual toilet stalls -- only ten of them for women.
That's only one of the challenges faced by the 7.5 million passengers who use the Mumbai suburban railway system each day. Other problems include:
1) Ten deaths each day but terrible emergency medical services
Ten Mumbaikars die on the overcrowded railway system every day, mainly when they try to cross the tracks. These lives could be saved if there were better emergency medical facilities such as stretchers and ambulances at each station, noted a public interest litigation filed before the Bombay High Court two years ago. Though courts directed the railways to provide such facilities, this order is yet to be carried out.
2) Bad engineering has created deadly gaps between platforms and trains
Approximately 350 passengers slipped to their deaths in the decade up to 2011 because of gaps between the platform and the trains. The gaps will get larger -- up to a foot-and-a-half -- in coming months because of the introduction of new coaches with higher footboards. But the railway ministry hasn't yet granted permission for the height of platforms to be raised.
3) 80% rise in harassment of women passengers
Nearly three million women travel on Mumbai's trains daily. In 2013, the Railway Police recorded an 80 per cent rise in sexual harassment cases against women.
4) Congested approach roads
Passengers will zip to the T2 terminal on a new six-lane elevated highway that cost Rs 570 crore. On the other hand, Mumbai authorities have been unable to execute a Rs 72-crore plan to decongest traffic outside merely four key railway stations to help commuters disperse more quickly.
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The T2 terminal offers passengers "an experience that’s at par with the best in the world", its website says. This includes "premium and high-end fashion and accessories" stores in 21,000 square meters of retail space; 6,000 pieces of Indian art from the sixth century through the 19th century in the corridors; and 5,000 square metres of landscaped areas.
Should they feel the need to go, the 40 million passengers who will use the terminal each year can pop into one of the facility's 101 toilet complexes, each featuring multiple stalls.
By contrast, the 3.75 million Mumbai suburban rail passengers who pass through the iconic Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus downtown each day have access to only 83 individual toilet stalls -- only ten of them for women.
That's only one of the challenges faced by the 7.5 million passengers who use the Mumbai suburban railway system each day. Other problems include:
1) Ten deaths each day but terrible emergency medical services
Ten Mumbaikars die on the overcrowded railway system every day, mainly when they try to cross the tracks. These lives could be saved if there were better emergency medical facilities such as stretchers and ambulances at each station, noted a public interest litigation filed before the Bombay High Court two years ago. Though courts directed the railways to provide such facilities, this order is yet to be carried out.
2) Bad engineering has created deadly gaps between platforms and trains
Approximately 350 passengers slipped to their deaths in the decade up to 2011 because of gaps between the platform and the trains. The gaps will get larger -- up to a foot-and-a-half -- in coming months because of the introduction of new coaches with higher footboards. But the railway ministry hasn't yet granted permission for the height of platforms to be raised.
3) 80% rise in harassment of women passengers
Nearly three million women travel on Mumbai's trains daily. In 2013, the Railway Police recorded an 80 per cent rise in sexual harassment cases against women.
4) Congested approach roads
Passengers will zip to the T2 terminal on a new six-lane elevated highway that cost Rs 570 crore. On the other hand, Mumbai authorities have been unable to execute a Rs 72-crore plan to decongest traffic outside merely four key railway stations to help commuters disperse more quickly.