As the suburban railway system is still closed for the regular people, the number of passengers travelling in Metros have tripled in a month, especially after the launch of Metro one from Ghatkopar to Versova.
After a period of seven months, when the Metro one service from Ghatkopar to Versova started from October 19, the number of passengers doubled within a week. Before the outbreak of the coronavirus hit the nation, the average passengers on a metro train was about 1,350 commuters at a time. However, currently, keeping in view the situation with the pandemic, only 360 passengers can travel at a time.
As per reports, at least 200 round trips are conducted every day on Metro one. However, about 72,000 passengers were expected to travel. The Metro one administration expected this number to be at least 60,000 or more. However, according to the numbers, only 45,000 passengers a day are availing this service on a regular basis.
On the other hand, the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA), which is expected to start trial runs for Metro-2A (Dahisar-DN Nagar) and Metro-7 (Dahisar East-Andheri East) corridors from January 2021, had earlier ordered 12 more train sets for the extension of these two lines. With this, the total train sets ordered by MMRDA has gone up to 96.
Moreover, it has ordered an additional 12 train sets of six cars each for the Metro-2B (DN Nagar-Mankhurd), Metro-7A and Metro-9 (Andheri to Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport and Dahisar to Mira Bhayander) from Bengaluru-based Bharat Earth Movers Limited (BEML).