Metro to resume 'line-wise'; most routes to be operational by Sept 12

New Delhi: Five months after a complete shutdown of Metro services, the longest-ever downtime for the mass rapid transport that crores in the Capital rely on, Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal on Wednesday approved the Delhi government's proposal to resume operations of the Delhi Metro and the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation on the same day announced the phased reopening of metro services in the city, which will begin on September 7.

The L-G is said to have given the green light in Wednesday's meeting of the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA).

The DMRC said that metro services will be reopened line-wise with specific timings and in three different stages. DMRC Managing Director Mangu Singh released the detailed standard operating procedure, which included the phased reopening of services. The first stage has been further bifurcated into three phases.

Under phase 1 of the first stage beginning on September 7, the Delhi Metro will function for four hours in the day (7am to 11am) and four hours in the evening (4pm to 8pm) and trains will be operated only on the Yellow Line (Samaypur Badli to Huda City Centre). Phase 2 of this stage will begin on September 9 with the reopening of the Blue Line (Dwarka Sector 21 to Noida Electronic City/Vaishali). Under phase 2, the Pink Line (Majlis Park to Shiv Vihar) will also resume. The third phase of the first stage is set to kick in on September 10 when the Red, Green and Violet Lines will resume operations.

As for the second stage beginning on September 11, the Magenta Line (Janakpuri to Botanical Garden) and the Grey Line (Dwarka to Najafgarh) will resume and by this time, all trains of the Delhi Metro will be operational between 7am to 1pm during the day and 4pm to 10pm during the evening. Following this, on September 12, under stage 3, the DMRC will resume services on the Airport Express Line and all trains will run from 6am to 11pm without interruption.

After observing the operation and its impact, we will introduce Red Line (Ghaziabad to Rithala), the Bahadurgarh line, and the Faridabad line from September 10, a senior DMRC official said.

The DMRC has also decided to open only select gates for entry at stations with a separate gate for exits, as well as regulation of the frequency of the trains. In an earlier statement by Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot who had clarified that smart-card holders would only be permitted to travel with the recharge of it going online. The token system will not be allowed, he had said.

The new normal in metros will include mandatory use of masks and social distancing. Those who do not adhere to the norms will be held accountable. "The metro act provides for punitive punishment," Puri said on Wednesday while announcing the guidelines for reopening metro services across the country. In case congestions are witnessed at metro stations, the decision will be reviewed, he said. Trains will not stop at stations falling in containment zones, and such stations will remain closed for the public, the DMRC said.

Meanwhile, the Noida Metro Rail Corporation also announced on Wednesday that they would resume operations from September 7 and issued guidelines according to which, the NMRC will run trains from 7 am to 11 am in the morning and 5 pm to 9 pm in the evening with a frequency of 15 minutes on all days except Sundays when the trains will operate from 8 am to 11 am during the day and from 5 pm to 9 pm in the evening. The temperature inside the train will be maintained in the range of 24-30 degrees Celsius.