CPEC’s KCR to be connected with five BRT projects in Karachi

Karachi: The Pakistani government plans to connect China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)’s Karachi Circular Railway (KCR) with five under-construction Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) corridors in Karachi to streamline traffic, a parliamentary committee was told.

Pakistan Railways officials, while briefing Senate’s Standing Committee on Pakistan Railways, shared the plan, the official details released after the meeting in Karachi said.

The meeting was presided over by Chairman Muhammad Qasim at City Station.

The Committee also recommended linking the KCR with Jinnah International Airport in order to provide benefit to passengers coming from abroad and within the country.

The Committee was informed that KCR will have electric trains and each train will have the capacity of not less than 814 passengers.

The Railway officials briefed the Standing Committee regarding encroachment on Pakistan Railway’s land in Sindh and the measures to restore the KCR to its original route.

“There is a plan to connect the KCR with the under-construction five BRT lines’ routes in the city,” a railway official told the meeting, according to the officially released details.

Among the BRT projects, Karachi Breeze is a 112.9 km network of Bus Rapid Transit lines under construction in Karachi. The name was officially given by the Sindh Mass Transit Authority for Karachi’s Bus and Mass Rapid Transit system.

So far only one line, Green Line, is ready to start service by the next month.

Karachi’s Green Line BRT with intersections, is 24 km long which includes 12.7 km elevated, 10.9 km at grade, and 422 meters underground, and has 25 stations.

The phase-II common corridor from Gurumandir up to Municipal Park with a length of 2.5 km has two underpasses at M.A Jinnah Road.

The other project in the list, the Orange Line BRT, was launched by former Sindh chief minister Qaim Ali Shah in June 2016 to facilitate about 50,000 residents of Orangi Town.

The Orange Line bus project covers a distance of four kilometres from the Orangi Municipal Office to Matriculation Board Chowrangi. A total of 18 buses would run under this system.

The Red Line project in the plan spans 26 km from Safoora to Tower. It is expected to have an average daily ridership of 625,000 passengers.

The 26-kilometer BRT Red Line project will connect Model Colony to Johar Complex en route Jinnah Avenue and Malir Cantonment while the buses will run through University Road, Hassan Square and Numaish roundabout.

The Sindh government had already awarded the contract for the civil work of the Red Line BRT project.

The Yellow Line BRT, to be connected to CPEC’s KCR, covers a distance of 21 kilometres from Dawood Chowrangi to Numaish Chowrangi.

The total cost of this project will be US $438.9 million.

According to the Sindh Mass Transit Authority (SMTA), Blue Line is also a proposed BRT project. The project’s initial planning suggests that the 9.6-kilometre-long project is designed to go from Al-Asif Square in Sohrab Goth to Gurumandir through Shahrah-e-Pakistan and would be eventually connected to CPEC’s KCR.

Last month, Prime Minister Imran Khan had performed the groundbreaking of construction of infrastructure for the elimination of level crossings for the loop section of CPEC’s KCR project.

The project envisages the construction of flyovers and underpasses along the route of KCR for the elimination of 22-level crossings. The rationalised cost of the project is Pakistani Rs 20.71 billion on a cost-sharing basis. The project will facilitate the free movement of the KCR train.

Under the KCR, 43km-long world-class affordable mass transit system using environment-friendly electric trains will be introduced.