Mumbai : Reliance Infrastructure promoted Mumbai Metro One Private Limited (MMOPL), the lifeline between Mumbai’s Western and Eastern suburbs, today completed four successful years of seamless and comfortable travel for over 400 million passengers.
To mark the completion of the coveted landmark in Mumbai’s transportation history, Chief Minister Mr. Devendra Fadnavis launched several initiatives at Versova Metro Station. Mr. Fadnavis inaugurated the “Majhi Metro Art” train of award-winning paintings, poems and photographs at the festival held earlier in the year.
In a unique initiative in the country, the Chief Minister launched the mobile metro ticketing product “Skiiip Q” where Metro commuters need no longer stand in queues for a ticket which can be generated by a QR code on the mobile phone.
He also released a Coffee Table book showcasing the four year journey of Mumbai Metro on the occasion.
Congratulating Mumbai Metro One on the occasion, Chief Minister Mr. Devendra Fadnavis said “Mumbai Metro One has changed the face of mobility in the Mumbai city. With the use of Metro, you don’t need a secondary transport system as it takes you closer to your destination. Mumbai Metro One has completely changed the space of Mass Rapid Transport in Mumbai and is the pioneer of the metro movement. The system planning and execution of Mumbai Metro One will help in shaping up upcoming Metro projects in the city”
“The Mumbai Metro is very efficient, clean, fast and green. In Mumbai suburban trains, the distance between two stations is usually two to three kilometers but in the metro, the distance between two stations is just a kilometer. The metro has helped in bringing down pollution, which is equal to planting 3 crore trees”, the Chief Minister added.
“The last four years have been very exciting and we are happy to make the commuter experience seamless and comfortable. Over the years, we have involved our commuters across various areas be it art and culture, technology or with various offerings which have helped in increase the ridership. We have also laid emphasis of commuter safety with series of stringent measures. We hope to continue adding more value to our esteemed commuters’ lives.” Mumbai Metro One spokesperson said.
The year saw Mumbai Metro One effectively amalgamating art, culture and technology with a series of initiatives to add seamless and exciting travel for the commuters.
The Majhi Metro Art festival kicked off before the formal launch of the Metro. This year’s festival was one of the novel community art projects where volunteers painted a wall outside the Metro Depot. The wall measuring at 378x15ft serves as a canvas to create India’s largest crowd sourced mural and bring art back into the people’s lives. The wall will depicted a version of Majhi Metro Art Train communicating this year’s theme “Art in Motion”. More than 3000 participants exhibited their poems, paintings and photographs with the award winning entries displayed in the Majhi Metro Art Train. This year the festival saw a few innovations to add to the vibes of this month long festival. Right from community wall art project to an art café at Andheri Metro station, to a poetry tree, light box and photography exhibition or simply unwinding at art café and trying their imagination on a blank canvas.
From art to technology, Mumbai Metro One is a step ahead of its counterparts. The Skiip Q facility in the mobile phone will mark a paradigm shift in terms of the way commuters travel. To make the product a success, Mumbai Metro One has joined hands with Paytm as the official ticketing partner. Gone are the days when the commuter had to stand in a queue to buy single or return journey tokens or to top up their trip or store value passes at ticketing counters and customer care centers of Mumbai Metro One. Instead of using tokens or smart cards, they can travel using QR code generated by mobile app on automated fare collection (AFC) gates of Mumbai Metro One. ‘Skiiip Q’ facility will help commuters to book their journey tickets at their own convenience even from outside the Metro stations. The facility is available on the Paytm App and app of technology partner Ridlr and will soon be introduced even in the Mumbai Metro App.
The four-year journey of Mumbai Metro has been creatively embossed in a coffee table book. Since its launch, Mumbai Metro One has strongly aligned with its vision to be the most admired and trusted metro company in the world, delivering safe, reliable and sustainable mode of travel to its customers at competitive costs with international standards of customer care, thereby creating superior value for all stakeholders.
The 11.4 km long Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar (VAG) line over the past four years is the preferred choice of daily commute for Mumbaikars. Every increase in ridership of Mumbai Metro One by 100 million is significant as the number of days it takes to reach the next landmark is decreasing. Mumbai Metro One took 398 days to carry its first 100 million commuters, 388 days to add another 100 million, while its third 100 million mark was achieved in just 337 days. The fourth 100 million commuters was added in only 300 days.
Mumbai Metro One operates 378 to 382 daily trips on weekdays. The year also marked high performance levels in punctuality and availability of trains. It operated 1,25,894 train trips in 2017-‘18 with punctuality performance of 99.9%.Operational excellence is benchmarked also in Peak Hour Peak Direction Traffic (PHPDT) which is approximately 29,000 commuters.
The impressive growth in the number of commuters is also attributed to the persistent efforts by Mumbai Metro One to provide value-added services, safety, cleanliness, and comfort that the commuters have come to expect from it.
