The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : 500 more MTC buses with GPS in offing

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Wednesday, Jul 30, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

500 more MTC buses with GPS in offing

Staff Reporter

Velachery bus stand to be shifted to a location near MRTS station

— Photo: S. Thanthoni

OPENING: M. Ramasubramanian, Managing Director, Metropolitan Transport Corporation, lighting a lamp to mark the inauguration of a consumer club at M.O.P. Vaishnav College for Women at Nungambakkam on Tuesday.

CHENNAI: The Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) is planning to introduce 500 more buses with Global Positioning System within a year in order to provide commuters with a cutting-edge technology-driven public transport system, its managing director M.Ramasubramanian said here on Tuesday.

Already MTC 55 buses with GPS were being operated, which helped in tracking the buses and announcing the exact time of arrival of the bus at the bus stop.

Mr. Ramasubramanian was addressing members of CLUB C, the consumer club of the students of M. O. P. Vaishnav College for Women, after inaugurating the club’s activities.

“Consumer awareness is low. The number of complaints made to the grievance cell started by the MTC in April this year to address concerns of consumers has been coming down. Last month only 30 complaints were received. We are now planning to display the telephone number of the grievance cell in all buses for better awareness,” he said.

MTC is also planning to increase the number of buses to 4,000 with the introduction of 1,000 new buses, at the cost of Rs.188 crore. Around 50 per cent of the new buses will be deluxe buses. Thirty new air-conditioned Volvo buses of international standard will also be introduced in the next two months. The Velachery bus stand will be shifted to a location near the MRTS station.

“Our goal is to make all necessary arrangements by January 2009 for providing our consumers very good service,” said Mr.Ramasubramanian.

“As an organisation with 20,000 employees and many labour unions, we also have constraints in fulfilling all the expectations of our consumers. But our primary concern is the welfare of MTC consumers,” Mr. Ramasubramanian said.

Noting that the MTC fare was the lowest in the country and the fleet conformed to the Bharat Stage III vehicular emission norms, he said the patronage for the services had increased by 8 lakh this month compared to the corresponding period last year. The increase was mainly due to the people switching over to the MTC from other modes.

The travel-as-you-please ticket scheme has generated Rs.4 crore revenue this year. More awareness of these tickets may help MTC generate more revenue. These 30-rupee tickets can be used to travel in MTC buses for a day. Monthly tickets cost Rs.600, he said.

“CLUB C is the first consumer club started by college students in Tamil Nadu,” Principal Nirmala Prasad said. “Our club’s focus is mainly on consumer awareness, with emphasis on rights and duties of consumer,” said S.Sreevidhya, president of CLUB C.

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