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Parel is a sweet spot in the Mumbai city. This place is enclosed by the western and central railways on its west and the Harbour railways on its eastern side. All the three railways are easily accessible from Parel and also the new mono rail cuts across this place. Many newcomers to Aamchi Mumbai mistake Parel to "Lower Parel" (Lower Parel is a different station on western railway line) and many also call this as "Upper Parel"!. Parel has a representing station called 'Elphinstone' on the western line and 'Parel' on the central railway line. Both these stations are connected internally and many wise people use these stations to move across from western to Central and vice versa to avoid the ever crowded Dadar station.
Brief history on Parel -- Parel has been a bustling place since the time I grew up here in the 70s. Earlier many of the vast landscapes were primarily consisted of mills and chawls of the laborers working in these mills. From the beginning of this decade the land scape and the sky line of Parel has changed boasting many prominent residential complexes, 5 star hotels and so on.
Parel is also known for various govt / municipal hospitals & med colleges acclaimed for serving people from all back grounds across the Asian continent. Hospitals like KEM (King Edward Memorial hospital), Wadia (maternity, for children) , Tata Memorial (prominently for cancer research and cure) , and few others are here since decades. Parel also boasted an independent shopping plaza since the 80s where in we could go and pick and choose items we want from the shelves using a basket / shopping cart . This place is called 'Apna Bazar' and has been run on a cooperative basis many years before the mall culture hit India. Almost every thing in one place for a middle class family is available . Parel also has a famous football maidan called St Xaviers football ground. A court (for legal matters) and couple of huge grounds are other attractions / land marks of Parel.

Pros:

• Connectivity, at the centre from almost all places in Mumbai.
• Several hospitals and railway stations nearby.
• Many prominent residential complexes, 5 star hotels and so on.

Cons:

• Lot of construction going on (mono rail , new buildings and so on).