The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation’s (BMC) proposal to build an underground sports complex and parking facility beneath the 500-acre Mahalaxmi Racecourse has drawn criticism from the Mumbai Architects Collective, who caution that such construction could compromise the city’s flood resilience. The Rs 600-crore plan, first reported in August 2025, remains conceptual, but architects argue the Racecourse serves as a vital hydrological buffer in Mumbai’s low-lying coastal landscape.
“The Mahalaxmi Racecourse is one of Mumbai’s last large, contiguous, natural grounds. In a low-lying coastal city with chronic flooding, this matters enormously. Natural ground absorbs rainwater, allows groundwater recharge, and reduces flood risk in the surrounding area. These are not incidental benefits; they are critical urban infrastructure functions,” the Collective wrote to municipal commissioner Bhushan Gagrani.
Architect Rahul Kadri stressed, “They are constructing an underground sports facility and stadium. Who is going to manage it? The main thing is that the entire arena is low-lying, and all the water in Parel when it rains acts like a holding pond in a major storm during high tide…Instead of that, the BMC is making 500 acres more impervious. It doesn’t make sense sustainability-wise, open space-wise, nor climate change-wise.”
PK Das echoed concerns about ecological impact: “Our concerns are environmental and ecological, where the ground will not be able to absorb the rainwater…Once you build underground, one will not have anything…As a result, the soil will dry up, and the water table will keep going down due to these kinds of underground constructions.”
Gagrani clarified the proposal remains preliminary: “It is at a conceptual stage only…Are we going to construct anything without considering the flooding aspect? It is a thematic conceptual drawing.” The BMC has engaged the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation to study the feasibility of a pedestrian subway linking the Acharya Atre Chowk Metro station, the Racecourse, and the Coastal Road parking hub.
No tenders or cost estimates have been drawn yet for the underground facilities. Gagrani added, “First, they opposed construction overground. Now they are saying there should be no construction, even underground.”
Source: Hindustan Times
