For commuters who have to jostle for space in the metro railway there will be no let up in the situation till next year.
The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation on Friday said more trains to its existing fleet and conversion of four coach trains into six coach trains will only happen next year.
At present, the DMRC has 129 train sets and by the end of 2011 the fleet will have 201 trains. According to DMRC officials, 112 of these 201 train sets will have four coaches and 89 trains will have six coaches.
“Orders have been placed for procuring extra coaches in the combination of motor car and trailer car, which will be coupled with the four coach trains to make them six coach trains. The extra coaches will start arriving from the end of this year and will be coupled with the existing train sets for conversion,” said a DMRC spokesperson.
Two trains have already been converted into six coach prototype trains and they are being tested at the DMRC maintenance depots.
DMRC officials said the additional coaches will have a capacity of 600 more passengers per train trip. “A four coach train has a carrying capacity ranging from 1,200 to 1,500 passengers. The six coach train will carry about 1,800 to 2,100 passengers per train trip,” the spokesperson said.
On Line 2 (Jehangirpuri to HUDA city Centre), 14 trains will be added into the system making the existing fleet of 44 trains into 58 train sets. Out of 58 trains, 51 trains will be six coach trains and seven will be four coach trains.
“On Line 3 and 4 (Dwarka- NOIDA and Yamuna Bank-Anand Vihar), three more trains will be added to make the existing fleet of 61 trains into 64 train sets. Thirty-six trains will have six coaches and 28 trains will have four coaches each. Six train sets will be added in the existing fleet of 25 train sets on Line 1 (Dilshad Garden to Rithala),” the spokesperson said.
The standard gauge Line 5 (Inderlok to Mundka) and Line 6 (Central Secretariat to Badarpur) currently have 42 train sets and 6 more trains will be added on these lines. Out of 48 train sets only 2 trains will be converted into six coach trains for Central Secretariat-Badarpur line.
After completion of Phase II, the metro network will be 185 km and the ridership is expected to go up to 20 lakh.
