The Mumbai Trans Harbour link will open huge parcels of land for real estate development, practically doubling the land of Mumbai, says Niranjan Hiranandani, Founder and Managing Director of Hiranandani Constructions.

The link, which is a road, 16.5 km of which is a bridge on the sea (Thane creek), connects south Mumbai with Navi Mumbai, cutting the travel time from two hours to 20 minutes.

As people can live in Navi Mumbai and work in south Mumbai, there will be opportunities to develop housing in Navi Mumbai, Raigad district, Hiranandani told businessline recently.

The foundation stone for the ₹18,000-crore link was laid by Prime Minister Modi on December 24, 2016. The project was conceived in the 1990s and suffered several false starts. Now that the ₹18,000-crore link has come alive, shortening the distance between places where people can live (Sewri, Ulwe, Navi Mumbai, Chembur, Panvel, etc) and places where there are jobs (south Mumbai), it unlocks scope for real estate development.

A further boost will come to Navi Mumbai when the new Navi Mumbai International Airport becomes operational. When all its three phases are completed, the airport will be capable of handling 90 million passengers, by 2032

Development manager model

Hiranandani said that the group has just begun working on a new model, which it calls ‘development manager’ model. Under this, it will put up projects for third parties—essentially providing them the whole suite of services such as design, architecture, construction and sales and marketing. ‘ELEVA by Hiranandani’ is the service provider.

In Mumbai, the company has five such projects. One, of 300,000 sq ft, was taken up last month, another will be taken up this month. “Three more are coming soon,” Hiranandani said.

Hiranandani said that development of housing will give a big boost to India’s growth. Today, housing contributes 7 per cent to India’s GDP, which, according to Niti Aayog, will be 20 per cent, when India becomes a $ 5 trillion economy, he said. Housing is the second largest provider of employment, after agriculture, and touches 270 feeder industries, such as cement, steel, wood, paint and bricks, he said. Therefore, when land becomes available for housing, it is good for the economy, he added.

Source: thehindubusinessline.com