Educational tour to Mumbai's key infrastructure projects

The students and faculty of School of Infrastructure visited Mumbai for an industrial tour from 26 September 2016 to 1 October 2016. The motive of this study tour was to make the students aware of how the projects are conceptualized, designed, planned, financed, constructed & implemented.

During the student tour, the students got a chance to witness various stages of projects because different projects were at different levels of development. The emphasis was on understanding the mindset of all the stakeholders and gather in-depth knowledge about a project’s lifecycle.

Site visit was essential to:

• Familiarize with the industry implementers
• Become practically aware of policies and meet policy makers

The visit gave the students a unique opportunity to have a look at Mumbai’s major infrastructure projects and find out about what happens behind the scenes.

This short video captures the summary of the entire tour in less than 5 minutes. Given below is a day by day account of the tour.

Day 1
Upon arrival in Mumbai city, the students were briefed about Navi Mumbai Airport, Walunj Project and Smart City Plan. The purpose was to give orientation to students about how an airport gets planned. The advantage was that class room teaching can be done only based on the assessment of past project but industrial visits help familiarize the students with live on-ground activities.

Later, the students were taken to visit the Solid Waste Management [SWM] Treatment Plant, being operated by Ramky Enviro Engineers Limited [REEL] on Public Private Partnership [PPP] mode under Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation [MIDC.] The visit was aimed at imparting knowledge about PPP and actual site components.
 
The day was concluded with a session by Chetan Zaveri, who is a Chartered Engineer holding a Master’s degree in Civil Engineering from CSU, Sacramento (USA) and recipient of the ISWA International Waste Manager - International Status title by ISWA, Austria. He interacted with students of School of Infrastructure about solid waste management.

Day 2
The second day of the visit started with a visit to the Jawahalal Nehru Port [JNPT.] It started with explaining the entire port project in the model room followed by watching an interactive model of the port, displaying all facilities on it. This was followed by visits to various terminals. A JNPT officer was made available to explain operations of each terminal. The Chairman of JNPT interacted with the students for some time, post lunch.

Later, the students were taken to visit a warehouse; a large scale facility of re-distribution of goods, arriving at port. Management games and entertainment programs were conducted post dinner.

Day 3
At the Worli Sea Link office of Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation [MSRDC], Anil Diggikar [MD, MSRDC] interacted with our students. It was followed by presentations by other officers/consultants to cover:

• Planning of Nagpur – Mumbai Express Highway Project, as a future project

• Story of Sea Link, as a completed project.

This was followed by round trip on Sea Link and explaining some features of Sea Link on site, which are otherwise not accessible.

With the Mumbai Metro Phase III entering into construction stage, the students got an opportunity to meet the Executive Director (Planning) of Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited [MMRCL]. It started with a welcome note and an initial brief. This was followed by three presentations - first by GM (Civil) to cover construction aspects, second by GM (Environment) to cover environmental and social issues and the third by GM (HR) to cover other aspects. Post these sessions, Ashwini Bhide, MD of MMRCL gave a concluding address to the students.

Day 4
The final day was spent at Goregaon. The students were taken to visit the Big-5 Construct India Exhibition, where 300 exhibitors from 15 countries showcased thousands of innovative international and local products related to building and construction. 

The students were provided exposure to international standards of material & technologies being used & developed globally. The visit was concluded at this point and the cohort headed back on the same day.

At RICS SBE, we believe in experiential learning and give as much industrial exposure to the students as possible and that was the core essence of this study tour.