Chennai Metro plans to run trains on lease for Phase II corridors

Anushka Khare Posted on: 2020-04-07 07:32:26 Viewer: 557 Comments: 0 Country: India City: Chennai

Chennai Metro plans to run trains on lease for Phase II corridors

Chennai, India (Urban Transport News): With the aims to save time and cost on procurement, operation, and maintenance, Chennai Metro Rail Limited (CMRL) is planning to run about 25% metro trains on lease for Phase II corridors. Earlier, a similar plan was made by Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) to run trains on lease in its Line 1 and Line 2 of Delhi Metro Rail network and floated tenders to get the response from private operators.

DMRC received responses from a total of 11 private operators but no further development made and the plan kept hold. "CMRL will follow a wet-lease model, where the company that leases out the trains will also operate and maintain them. The train will come with crew and maintenance staff," said a CMRL official. "Once we finish floating tenders for civil work, we will start calling tenders for systems which include trains.

It will be similar to government departments hiring cars from an agency and letting them operate and maintain them," he added, reported TOI. CMRL is in hope of to commence the construction of tunnels along the 52 km priority corridor at the beginning of 2021 and the corridor is likely to be ready in five years. According to the terms and conditions of project funding body Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), CMRL will procure metro coaches from Japan for the upcoming corridors from Madhavaram to Sholinganallur and Madhavaram to CMBT.

For the remaining corridors, CMRL will seek assistance from private operators to run trains on a lease basis. "We will have three types of rolling stock - trains from Japan, through international competitive bidding and through wet-lease model. None of the metro rail networks in the country have hired trains, but NITI Aayog is now making it mandatory for future metro rail projects to follow the wet-lease model," the official said, reported TOI.

"We do not know if we will save any money by taking trains on a lease, but we do not have to worry about operations and maintenance. If there is a breakdown or any other emergency the contractor will handle it," an official said. As per the detailed project report (DPR) of Chennai Metro Phase 2, it will initially require 138 trains to cater to an estimated daily ridership of 19.2 lakh.





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