The trial runs of metro rakes on the Mumbai Metro Line 2 A (DN Nagar Andheri to Dahisar West) and line 7 (Dahisar East to Andheri East) will begin from January 14, 2021 on the day of Makar sankranti, Hindu auspicious festival said MMRDA Commissioner R A Rajeev on Thursday. The trial runs will remain for a month and later with initial 10 rakes of six coaches each the services will be opened up for the public from May 2021 onwards, he declared further.
The two metro lines were initially proposed to be operational by December 2020, however due to the lockdown, the dateline of project was delayed by a few months.
The first train will be delivered to Mumbai from Bangalore in the month of December this year. Later, three rakes each will be delivered in January, February, March , April and with total 10 rakes, the metro operations will be initiated on both the lines at a time gap of 20-25 minutes. With addition of rakes the time gap will reduce subsequently, informed the commissioner.
The authority is confident that it will be able to complete all pending civil construction work before the metro services are made operational. So far 13 kilometres (kms) of track laying work completed on Metro Line 2A out of 40kms. Similarly, 11.5 kms of track laying work completed on Metro Line 7 out of total 32kms.
Besides, to expedite the metro related construction activity MMRDA has also written to the Indian Railway board to run special trains in order to bring back the workers who went to their villages due to lockdown.
As per the 2016 fare fixation committee, commuters will spend Rs 10 for 0-3 kilometres, Rs 20 for for 3-12km, Rs 30 for 12-18kms, Rs 40 for 18km -24km, Rs 50 for 24-30km and so on, on their metro journey.
