“Since the Pune ring road connects eight national highways/expressways, the MSRDC is keen on setting up at least five logistics hubs along the stretch,” MSRDC managing director Radheshyam Mopalwar announced. He said logistics hubs would come up along the expressways across the state and this would benefit both the agriculture and manufacturing sector in a big way.
Multi-modal logistics parks in hub and spoke model are part of most highways across the country. They help in lowering overall freight cost by cutting warehousing cost, reducing vehicular pollution and congestion, improving tracking and traceability of consignments through infrastructural, procedural and information technology interventions.
Mopalwar said both the multi-modal corridor (connecting Virar to Alibaug) and the Pune ring road would open up new geographies for development in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region and the Pune Metropolitan Region, which would help in decongesting the current urban sprawl.
MSRDC has already notified 18 locations on Samruddhi Mahamarg for logistics hubs/ townships/ krishi samruddhi kendras. On the same lines, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority has notified nine townships across the multi-modal corridor. The Pune ring road will follow the same model, he said.
Last week, Leader of Opposition Ajit Pawar had suggested setting up of hubs housing wholesale markets for decongesting the old city areas. Three years ago, the Federation of Trade Associations of Pune (FTAP), the umbrella body of various traders’ associations in the city, had approached the Pune Metropolitan Region Development Authority to provide around 1,000 acres of land on lease to shift 34 wholesale and semi-wholesale markets from the congested city areas to the outskirts.
FTAP president Fatechand Ranka has written several letters to the state government for shifting the wholesale market from the heart of the city to a location near the ring road. He said they were looking for contiguous land to set up one of the best wholesale markets in the state. The demand for land has found support from the Pune Plywood Dealers Association, Pune Transport Association, Pune Automobile Dealers Association, Used Car Dealers Association, Brass and Copper Merchant Association and Stainless Steel Merchant Association, among others.
