Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Capital Development Authority (CDA) on Monday said the trial run of the metro bus service from Peshawar Morr to Islamabad International Airport (IIA) would start in the first week of April after the arrival of buses from China.

The authority had planned to run at least 30 buses painted in orange colour on the route, however the current shipment was carrying 15 buses, CDA’s senior official told APP.

He said the ship transporting the buses would start its journey to Karachi on March 15. The ship was expected to arrive from China in 20 days.

The launch of bus service, he said would improve the public transport facility in the city.

The federal apex agency had announced to start bus service operation on March 23 but the same was delayed due to some unavoidable circumstances.

The CDA took over the metro bus project in March last year from the National Highway Authority (NHA) on the direction of the federal government and started the process to procure the buses.

For the fiscal year 2020-21, the government had earmarked Rs300 million for the project.

The corridors and stations of the metro track had already been constructed and now command and control, ticketing, station management, cleanliness and security systems were being completed.

In March last year, NHA after construction of the corridor and stations handed over the project to the CDA.

The NHA had launched work on the 25.6km-long track from Peshawar Morr to IIA worth Rs16 billion in Jan 2017. The project was supposed to complete in Aug 2018 but its civil work was completed last year.