Gurgaon: Rapid Metro’s second phase will miss the revised deadline of September 2016. The Phase 2 construction, happening at a cost of Rs 2,143 crore, started in April 2013.
Rapid Metro has extended the deadline twice now. While it first said operations would begin by mid-2016 and months later gave out the date as September 2016, on Tuesday, a spokesperson for Rapid Metro said, “The commercial operations will start by the last quarter of 2016.”
Phase 1 of the country’s first fully privately fiananced Metro service, a loop beginning and ending at Sikanderpur, has officially brought in a ridership of 35,000-40,000, far lesser than the expected 1 lakh in the first year of operation. So, Rapid Metro is banking on Phase 2 to make up for the shortfall in ridership.
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The latest deadline of end-2016 is unrealistic as, by its own admission, about 25% of construction work is yet to be completed.
A source, on condition of anonymity, said that given the realities, it was impossible to meet the deadline.
The Rapid Metro spokesperson said work was progressing at a fast pace for the south extension of Rapid Metro. “We have completed approximately 75% of our project. We are pretty much on track for starting commercial operations by the last quarter of 2016,” he said, adding that external factors had led to some delays.
