It is over a month since the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests accorded the green signal to the stymied hill station project Lavasa, effectively clearing the decks for construction work to resume, but regaining momentum after more than a year's hiatus is proving to be a tough task for the beleaguered Corporation.
Even if Lavasa manages to garner the necessary financial resources, marshalling together the massive work force required for the construction work is proving to be a mammoth task as most of them have been redeployed on other construction sites.
The camps built to accommodate workers stand deserted and residential units flanking the lake and hillsides of the first town Dasave are in various stages of construction, their scaffolding intact but sans labourers.
“When the work stopped, there was a 10,000-strong labour force working on the project,” a spokesperson for Lavasa Corporation said, adding that the company had begun the task of mobilising the work-force and will ramp-up construction work in early January 2012.
Schedule
All the other work like water and sewage treatment plants, telecom and road network, school, hotels and primary health centre in Dasave was complete, and delivery of the first residential units (of a total of around 2,000, all of which have been booked) will begin by next month, the spokesperson said. This is the first phase of the project, and covers 1,750 acres or approximately 15 per cent of the 12,500 acre master-plan.
The next phase involving construction in Mugaon, the second of four towns at Lavasa, is also scheduled to start early next year. Billed as the hill city's edutainment and entertainment zone, the highlights include a 60-acre theme park being built along the lines of a similar park in Huntsville, Alabama by the US Space and Rocket Centre.
The plan in Mugaon also includes building 4,000-odd residential units and a new road to Mumbai via Lonavala that will reduce the travel distance between Mumbai and Lavasa by 60-odd km.