: In the two-and-a-half years since its inauguration, the Coastal Road has witnessed 12 crashes involving high-end cars which have claimed at least seven lives — the BMW crash of Sunday morning being the latest tragedy. An imaginative infrastructure project which was supposed to cut short the commute between south Mumbai and the western and northern suburbs, has become a challenge for the traffic police to monitor, as young drivers often pull off late-night stunts or recklessly speed.
“We have to listen to loud noise of speeding through the night. We also watch out for lane-changing violators through CCTVs. Mantayya Swami, chief engineer of Coastal Road, has, however, another view.
Police routinely take action against errant drivers; on September 3 they seized 11 cars and SUVs after a video of the cars racing on the Coastal Road went viral on social media. Despite dialling number 100, these kids do not care,” he said. Traffic police officers said while the 10-kilometer stretch was designed to ease congestion and cut travel time along Mumbai’s western coastline, the recent fatal accidents have highlighted the necessity of adhering to a speed limit and lane discipline on the eight-lane corridor.
Sana Khan, a former professor, who took the video said: “We were driving from Kemps Corner towards Churchgate when we saw some luxury cars, including a Lamborghini and BMWs, zooming past, dangerously overtaking our car from the left side. She recorded the act “as the errant drivers were required to be dealt with appropriately”. “The entitled kids need to understand that reckless driving costs much more than money,” said Worli Residents Association president Viren Shah, who has had to knock at the door of traffic police several times to bring to their notice the issue of speeding on the Coastal Road. A BMC officer HT spoke to however said, major curved feeder ramps and loops are already located at specific multi-level junctions at Marine Drive, Amarsons Garden, Breach Candy, Haji Ali, and Worli where warning signs have been placed, telling drivers to lower speed. “While speed limits have been mandated, high-end speed cameras installed on the road detect violations, sending the feed to the traffic police control room, which issues e-challans to the owners of the speeding vehicles,” said a traffic police officer, adding that as the stretch is like an expressway in the middle of the city, posting officials there to keep the violators in check is not possible. Rajendra Godse, senior police inspector of Tardeo traffic police chowkie said, “We regularly catch violators such as heavy vehicles and two wheelers trying to enter the Coastal Road. “Rules are there, some do not want to follow, putting themselves and the lives of their loved ones in danger,” he said, adding, “cameras and rumblers are fitted according to the Indian Standard (IS) code and warning signs are in place ahead of all curves and yet people speed and race”.
One such accident occurred in July 2026, when a speeding Porsche dashed into the divider behind Breach Candy Hospital, and another in September 2025, when a Lamborghini crashed into the divider near Worli after the driver lost control of the vehicle. In March this year, Juhu resident Rushabh Aneja lost control of his BMW and crashed into a side barrier, while a 19- and a 22-year-old were booked in the same month for racing when one of them lost control and rammed into the side of the tunnel. over a period of time, many have not been as fortunate and suffered injuries in crashes While Khan and others in the car made a lucky escape.
