In relief for commuters travelling between Pune and Mumbai, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has cleared the detailed project report (DPR) for a new high-speed expressway between the two
cities. News18 had earlier reported a second Mumbai-Pune Expressway parallel to the existing one has been announced by Union minister for road transport and highways Nitin Gadkari. Gadkari had said an expressway, parallel to the existing Pune-Mumbai expressway, with an estimated construction cost of Rs 15,000 crore, will bring down the travel time between the two cities to one-and-a-half hours.
About Mumbai-Pune Expressway 2: Travel in 90 minutes
The eight-lane access-controlled expresswaywill be built to handle nearly three lakh vehicles a day, Hindustan Times reported.
The route will integrate seamlessly with Mumbai’s Atal Setu and Pune’s upcoming Ring Road, creating a continuous high-capacity transport spine across western Maharashtra.
The expressway will start near Atal Setu, connect Navi Mumbai International Airport and Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) and pass through the Sahyadri range using a network of tunnels and elevated bridges before terminating at Shivare in Bhor taluka. By linking directly with Pune’s Ring Road, vehicles heading towards Satara, Kolhapur, and Bengaluru will bypass Pune city entirely.
The work will begin after clearances, with NHAI targeting completion within three years.
The Union minister said road works of Rs 50,000 crore have been approved for the Pune region, and construction will begin in the next three months.
Road works of Rs 1.50 lakh crore have been approved for Maharashtra. The work will start in 2026. Among these projects, the PWD has been given work worth Rs 50,000 crore, he added.
अत्यंत आव्हानात्मक असा प्रकल्प एमएसआरडीसीने आपल्या हाती घेतला असून त्याचे ९४ टक्के काम पूर्ण झाले आहे. विशेष म्हणजे ८५ किलोमीटर प्रति तास वेगाने वारे वाहत असताना १८५ मीटर उंचीचे खांब उभे करून त्यावर केबल स्टडेड ब्रिज तयार करण्याचे काम आता अंतिम टप्प्यात आले आहे. तसेच लोणावळा… https://t.co/jLaXF1zT30 pic.twitter.com/csco2i9Qe0
— Eknath Shinde – एकनाथ शिंदे (@mieknathshinde) July 12, 2025
Why Mumbai-Pune Expressway matters
Named after former chief minister Yashwantrao Chavan, the Mumbai-Pune expresswaywas opened to traffic in 2002. The expressway sees around 75,000 vehicles, including goods and transport vehicles, a day. The number is up to 1,10,000-120,000 vehicles on weekends and holidays, leading to traffic jams and congestion.
The Mumbai-Pune Expressway could soon become superfast as the much-awaited 13-km ‘missing link’ project has now reached its final stage. The missing link will help motorists bypass the Lonavla-Khandala ghat section. Currently, the distance between Khopoli and the Sinhgad Institute via the expressway is 19 kilometres, much of it through a ghat section.
The link which begins at Khopoli and ends at the Sinhgad Institute (Pune) will get two eight-lane tunnels (1.75 km and 8.92 km long); two eight-lane viaducts (790 m and 650 m long) and a 640-metre cable-stayed bridge that soars 100 metres above the Tiger Valley in the Lonavala-Khandala section. It then goes through an 8.9-kilometre tunnel — some parts of which are as deep as 170 feet beneath the ground with the Lonavala lake resting above it.
