New Delhi: Imagine stepping onto a train in Mumbai and getting off in Ahmedabad before a movie finishes. That idea, which once sounded futuristic dream, is now turning into something far more real as India’s first bullet train project gathers pace across Maharashtra and Gujarat.
The work progress shows that the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail corridor has moved far beyond concept drawings. It is evolving into a large and complex engineering build that will change how people travel along one of India’s busiest economic routes.
The 508-kilometre line between the two cities is now taking form across long stretches of viaducts, newly built bridges, deep tunnels and busy station construction sites. Engineers involved with the project say the corridor will support operations at 320 kilometres per hour, which will bring the total travel time to less than two hours.
Nearly 320 kilometres of viaduct work has already been completed, and land acquisition, tunnelling, station interiors and electrification are advancing at the same time. Officials continue to point to 2027 for the first operational run and expect the full corridor to be ready in 2029.
Built with Japanese collaboration, the project brings Shinkansen standards together with Indian construction capacity on a scale not attempted before.
One of the developments of this year has been India’s readiness to adopt Japan’s next-generation E10 Shinkansen for the corridor. The plan under review features a train design built around sleeker aerodynamics, calmer cabins and a larger passenger capacity. The model also includes upgraded braking and safety systems that match the specifications of India’s planned 320-kilometre-per-hour track and signalling network.
This move strengthens the technology partnership between India and Japan, and it allows the country to begin its high-speed era with rolling stock that belongs to the latest class of bullet trains.
The physical transformation along the corridor has become most visible through the large steel bridges rising over rivers, highways and freight lines. This year brought a series of rapid installations, including a 70-metre steel bridge placed over the Dedicated Freight Corridor tracks near Vadodara.
Soon after, engineers installed a 60-metre and 485-ton bridge in a seven-hour window, marking the tenth such launch on the project. A total of 28 steel bridges are planned. Each one is fabricated in large workshops and moved into place using multi-axle trailers, a method that allows the precision needed for high-speed rail operations.
At the Mumbai end, an underground mobility upgrade is beginning to come together. Three interconnected pedestrian walkways are being built to link Metro Line 3, the Worli and BKC zones and the upcoming bullet train terminal. Since BKC will serve as the Mumbai terminal for the high-speed corridor, the linked walkway system is expected to help manage heavy passenger movement by offering smooth transfers between the metro, office clusters, parking spaces and the bullet-train concourse.
When finished, the 3-kilometre underground network will become one of the most advanced multi-modal transit spaces in the country.
One of the toughest engineering tasks in the entire project, the 21-kilometre tunnel connecting BKC and Thane with an undersea section, also recorded an important breakthrough in 2025. Crews achieved a 4.88-kilometre breakthrough near the Shilphata-Ghansoli stretch.
The tunnel is being built using the New Austrian Tunnelling Method along with advanced waterproofing and lining systems. It includes India’s first underwater tunnel designed specifically for high-speed trains. Since the bullet train cannot enter Mumbai without this link, this year’s progress is seen by officials as one of the most crucial steps forward.
In Ahmedabad, the Sabarmati area is undergoing a redesign as part of the upcoming multimodal hub. The district around the bullet train station is being prepared for a cluster of hotels, corporate offices, urban plazas and recreational spaces, all planned around a transit-driven layout. Planners envision Sabarmati as India’s first integrated smart business district centred on a high-speed rail terminal.
Officials involved in the redevelopment often describe the area as the future “gateway to high-speed rail in India”, because of its combination of commuter access, commercial infrastructure and public services.
The government decided in November 2025 that the first operational stretch of the bullet train will run between Surat and Vapi, covering about 100 kilometres. This part of the corridor is ahead of others in terms of track laying, viaduct construction and station structures, making it suitable for the initial testing of running speeds, safety systems and passenger operations.
Authorities plan the first run for August 2027. Once services expand north toward Ahmedabad and south toward Thane and Mumbai, the entire 508-kilometre journey will take less than two hours.
The work completed through 2025 has revealed how deeply the project has begun influencing engineering practices, technology partnerships and urban development. India’s construction capabilities have grown in areas such as undersea tunnelling and large-scale steel bridge installation.
The Indo-Japanese partnership has strengthened around next-generation Shinkansen technology. Cities along the corridor, especially Mumbai and Ahmedabad, are seeing fresh waves of urban planning linked to high-speed rail.
The next phase between 2026 and 2029 will involve finishing the remaining tunnels and viaducts, completing station interiors and platform systems and advancing signaling and electrification and trial runs.
Shinkansen-compatible trains will be delivered for testing, and the corridor will open in stages starting with the Surat–Vapi section in 2027. If the project stays on track, India is set to join the global high-speed rail league before the decade ends, marking one of the most significant transport milestones in the country’s modern infrastructure story.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: ZEE News
