The Hindu : New Delhi News : `Metro, Railways should be complementary'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Apr 02, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

`Metro, Railways should be complementary'

By Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar

NEW DELHI, APRIL 1. Delhi needs a regional railway and suburban rail services at around 5 minutes' frequency on dedicated rail corridors along the six railway lines running through it if it has to seriously address the issue of road congestion and provide people an option of living in the satellite townships and commuting to work comfortably, the Managing Director of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation, E. Sreedharan, said today.

"Metro has to be supported by other modes and the Railways has an important role to play in Delhi. We are fortunate to have lines coming in from six directions and if we are able to run suburban trains on the pattern of Mumbai that would serve a great purpose,'' the seasoned engineer said, adding that all this can be planned and implemented through creation of a special purpose vehicles like DMRC. This, he said, would help people live in cleaner surrounding and more spacious homes as their commuting time would remain low at around 30 to 40 minutes only.

Pointing out that the Integrated Rail Bus Transit system was planned on similar lines, he lamented that it has not taken off. "The way the Golden Quadrilateral road scheme has been devised and implemented, we need intervention from the top to get this project going,'' said the man behind the Delhi Metro and Konkan Railway projects.

Stating that he had not allowed the Holambi Kalan Metro line as that ran parallel to the Railway line, Mr Sreedharan said railways and Metro should not compete; they should only complement each other. Also, he said, the suburban services on the six lines should not terminate in Delhi. Instead they should just run through it to provide travel across the city in six different directions.

"What we need here is a Regional Railway System as in Montreal since we are now talking about catering to the National Capital Region. We want people to spread out and not concentrate on the heart of the city,'' Mr Sreedharan said, adding that constructing the suburban system would require a fraction of the funds required for the Metro and can even be achieved ahead of the Commonwealth Games 2010.

"The Delhi Metro has got all the expertise for planning and construction and this can be used for the purpose. Further, though localisation and transfer of technology, the cost of construction has come down instead of going up. Taking the cost six years ago as base, the cost of construction should have arisen 30 per cent by now owing to an average 5 per cent inflation rate. But on the contrary, due to indigenisation, the cost of constructing the elevated corridors has dropped 2 per cent and the underground corridors by 15 per cent.''

In such a scenario, Mr Sreedharan hoped that the suburban rail system would be promoted. "I have already placed my views on record. I hope the Prime Minister or someone high up takes note of it,'' he said.

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