Now, Maazi Metro to run at 80 km/h speed on Orange route

Concept of Mass Rapid Transport System (MRTS) would be a reality in city from Wednesday onwards when Maazi Metro will start running at full speed on Khapri-Sitabuldi Inter-change station on Orange route. From November 27, Maharashtra Metro Rail Corporation Limited (MMRCL) plans to run metro services of Nagpur Metro at 80 km/hr, the maximum permissible on this 11.5 km route. With all clearances in place, commuters would now realise advantages of travelling on metro as the distance would be covered within 25 minutes. Coinciding with running services at full speed, Nagpur Metro would also introduce a shuttle train every 15 minutes on either direction on North-South route.

With high speed metro services starting in real sense, hopefully more number of commuters are going to be attracted for travelling. First services from either end, Khapri as well as Sitabuldi would start at 8 am, while last train timing would be 8 and 8.30 pm, respectively. In all throughout the day 100 services are planned to be run on Orange route so that commuters can time their travel anytime during morning, afternoon or evening hours. Currently those who are riding on Maazi Metro are only joy riders so the cash registers are not exactly jingling for Maha Metro Corporation.

Unless footfalls increase on regular basis the corporation would find it difficult to break even in next few years. Ridership is the sole basis for determining success and now what is needed is proper linkage of metro stations with interior localities in their vicinity for seamless movement of commuters. Right now only the Wardha Road route is operational and Metro is hoping that those wishing for travelling to Sitabuldi for shopping and other purpose would prefer a ride on Maazi Metro. Sitabuldi being centre of city most of citizens do cross the area at least once in a day and hence Metro is appealing citizens off various localities of Wardha Road to adopt Metro and ride in comfort and safety.

About four stations are thrown open to commuters on the Wardha Road, three are on At-Grade section and one more is Jaiprakash Nagar, it is elevated one. Ajni Square is likely to be commissioned in next two months but one major station that can increase footfall could be Somalwada station. There is still a long time to go, perhaps one more year before this station could be opened for travellers. From Somalwada a big crowd could be attracted to Metro as from it in nearly 2 to 3 sq.kms area thousands of people have come to reside in New Nagpur area.

Also by December the subway at Manish Nagar too is planned to be opened-up and this way reaching upto Wardha Road would become hassle free. Hence the earlier Ujjwal Nagar station is commissioned the better it would be for all. The key to running metro services at full speed is usage of communication based train control (CBTC) is a railway signalling system that uses telecommunications between the train and track equipment for traffic management and infrastructure control. With help of the CBTC systems, exact position of a train is known more accurately than with traditional signalling systems. While running high speed trains safety of commuters is highest priority and hence multiple tests were held since commercial services started on the route. The tests were conducted by Research Design and Standards Organisation (RDSO) team who vigorously checked all the signalling system, wayside equipments, the train sets and then only okayed running metro at full speed.