Additional metropolitan commissioner, Milind Mhaiskar said, “Usually our target is to have 1000 rental housing tenements per hectare. But in this case, since the land parcel is huge, we plan to have a holistic approach. We will be having a separate plan for the project in which along with residential complexes there would also be public amenities like hospitals and schools.”

Over the next five years, the MMRDA plans to construct five lakh homes; each with an area of 160 sq ft in the whole of Mumbai Metropolitan Region. The MMRDA plans to accomplish this either independently or in collaboration with developers and landowners who can offer a minimum of 500 sq metre of land for the project. Of this officials state that as many as two lakh homes will be constructed over the next one year. As part of phase one of the rental housing scheme, the MMRDA has already tied up with Dhanashree Developers to construct 35,000 houses on 100 acre of land at Vasai. The homes would be allotted to families that do not own a house in the metropolitan region and have a minimum family income of Rs 5000.

The Borivali project would be the first rental housing project which the MMRDA would be executing on its own. AR Wankhede, estate manager for MMRDA said, “The land, which is a part of the abandoned Khatau mills, is in a prime location and is completely unencumbered except for scarp machinery. With a Floor Space Index of 4, we will be potentially having about 160 acres of land at our disposal.” He added that 4000 sq metre of land in Thane is another location for creation of tenements under the projects.