Ahmedabad Metro train faces technical glitch again, operation hampered for around half an hour

Ahmedabad:
The Ahmedabad Metro train which was recently inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and is currently on a 6.5-km stretch from Vastral in the Eastern part of the city today again faced some technical glitches and its operations were reportedly suspended for around half an hour.

PM Modi had inaugurated the Metro project on March 4 after which this was the second incident of technical glitch with the 3 coach South Korea made train. From March 5 the train is on a free of charge run for 10 days from 10 am to 4 pm. A few days ago the air conditioning system of the train had faltered.

An official associated with the operation said that the engineers rectified the issue and the train then ran normally. He also said that it was normal to have a few small glitches during the initial runs.
Notably after inaugurating the 6.5 km strech connecting Vastral to Apparel park area here, Modi also took a ride on the metro from Vastral gam to Nirant Crossing station and back. He had also inaugurated the second phase of the ambitious project the same day.

The first phase of the project costs around Rs 10,773 crore, for which Japan has extended a soft loan of Rs 6,066 crore to the Indian government through its funding agency JICA (Japan International Cooperation Agency). The phase one of the project is to cover a distance of 40.03 km, of which 6.5 km is underground and the rest of the stretch is elevated.

Phase one comprises of two corridors. The north-south corridor runs from APMC to Motera along the existing railway line and will cover a distance of 18.87 km. The east-west corridor connects Thaltej to Vastral in the city covering a distance of 21.16 km. There will be a total of 32 stations in phase one.

Notably, the then CM Anandiben Patel had done the ground breaking for the phase one of this metro project in March 2015.

The Ahmedabad Metro trains would be a three coach set up like the inaugural one and would be capable of carrying around 800 to 900 passengers. These fully automatic coaches have been designed in South Korea. The number of coaches could be extended up to six. The metro stations have been designed in a way where six coaches can be parked. There is a sitting facility for around 40 person’s while in all around 250 to 300 people could travel standing in the coaches. These coaches like Delhi metro have station indicators above the entry.exit doors.

The metro can travel at a maximum speed of 90km per hour but would maintain the average of 80kmph.

Work on the second phase of Metro would start from June -July this year, a senior Metro official claimed.

The project is being implemented by Gujarat Metro Rail Corporation (GMRC) Limited, SPV of Government of India and Government of Gujarat which was formerly known as Metro-Link Express for Gandhinagar And Ahmedabad (MEGA) Company Limited.