Navi Mumbai: An IIT-Bombay team recently visited the Palm Beach Road underpass site at Sanpada Sector-19 in Navi Mumbai.The team, led by professor and dean of transportation systems engineering, inspected the site after the Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) approached IIT-B to suggest a suitable alternative plan to save a maximum number of trees. A total of 440 trees — 329 will be transplanted through relocation and 111 will be chopped — will be affected due to the project, which the locals are opposing.The civic body has confirmed the IIT-B visit, but declined to reveal more information regarding the same. An NMMC official handling the project said, “Only after receipt of the IIT-B report for the tunnel road project, we will make any comment. Only one visit has been made by the team.”The IIT-B team is into traffic safety, modeling pedestrian behaviours, traffic flow modeling and simulation, control and public transit system design and operation headed by Prof Vedagiri Perumal. The NMMC has green signaled the project in 2023.Activist Shrikant Patki said, “We welcome NMMC’s decision to involve IIT-B. It gives us hope as efforts are being made to seek expert views to save the trees. Many residents of Sanpada, including urban planners and engineers are ready to help find alternatives. We are committed to doing everything possible to protest our trees.”The locals had organized two silent human chain protests – one at the site and another at the NMMC headquarters — pressing their demand to save the trees through change in the design. An amicable solution to the traffic problem is the need of the hour while giving access to Sanpada and Juinagar nodes. With no other access point available to these nodes from the Palm Beach Road the civic body is all set to execute the work.The underpass work, which started on December 15, 2025, is proposed to be completed by October 14, 2027. The Rs 33.8-crore work will be executed within an 18-month period, excluding monsoon months.
