Ggn bus service reeling under ridership challenge

Gurugram: Even though the Gurugram Metropolitan City Bus Limited (GMCBL) claimed that the revenue is rising steadily, increasing the ridership is still proving to be a challenge for the newly launched city bus service.

At present, there are two routes on which the city bus service with over 50 buses famously titled 'Gurugraman' operates.

The buses plying in 212 route operates from Basai chowk to Huda City Centre covering a total area of 25 kilometers, Route 112 operates from Sector 54 to Palam Vihar 212 route is proving the cash cow for the Gururgam bus service where revenue on per weekly basis has increased to Rs 9.50 lakh from Rs four lakh when launched in September last year.

In contrast to this, finding ridership for route 112 has been a struggle as the revenue has spiked marginally from Rs two lakhs to Rs three lakhs on weekly basis.

Taking into consideration both these routes, the Gurugraman rakes in over Rs 13 lakh per week.

To improve the connectivity in the city the state government will be bringing in 150 more buses in the coming months. Skepticism, however, has been expressed by certain residents that the city bus service must not take the route of Haryana roadways which is running under the loss of over Rs 600 crores.

Moreover, the popularity of a large number of diesel autos and local bus services remain because of their low fares.

Taking note of challenges, the GMDA officials are ensuring that there is no let down as far as the services are concerned.

Not only are the ticketing facilities digitised but there will also be a customer service attendant to assist the customers.

A survey conducted by GMDA had revealed that 75 per cent of the respondents mentioned that they will like to commute through public transportation while 25 per cent highlighted that they were more comfortable using their personal vehicles.

One of the major issues raised by the citizens for not using public buses is lack of proper schedule and overcrowding.