Fresh trouble brewing for Water Metro project

Even as the rolling out of the first Water Metro ferry has overshot its revised deadline by over six months, fresh trouble is brewing for Kochi Metro Rail Limited, as heritage enthusiasts have yet again objected to the construction of a jetty near the iconic Chinese fishing nets that dot the Fort Kochi beachfront. A row of three heritage buildings located behind the nets — on land owned by the Cochin Port Trust — had been demolished in December 2020 to create space for the Water Metro’s Fort Kochi jetty, despite fiery opposition from heritage enthusiasts and conservation architects. The construction of the Water Metro jetty at Mattancherry too has been embroiled in delays, despite KMRL saying that ferries would operate on the Ernakulam-West Kochi route after operations begin on the Vyttila-Kakkanad stretch. The Water Metro’s Operational Control Centre next to its Vyttila jetty too has not been completed, over four months since Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan inaugurated the ₹747-crore project’s first route.