Since its inaugural run on June 21,the 14.47-km Qutab Minar-HUDA City Centre Metro corridor is yet to fill up to capacity,unlike the other stretches which overshot ridership estimates in the first week of their inauguration. Being a standalone line without connecting Metro services,trains on this route have been far from crowded,attracting mostly tourists and those taking joy rides. The corridor opened with approximately 33,000 commuters on the first two days and in more than a week it has registered an average ridership of around 45,000 commuters per day. The Noida City Centre line,a 13.1-km extension of the Dwarka Sector 9-Yamuna Bank line overshot estimated ridership of 60,000 passengers on the first day itself with around 63,000 passengers taking the ride. However,DMRC officials maintained that such comparisons are inappropriate as the Gurgaon Metro corridor is a standalone line,with no connecting services. The ridership figures of 1.6 lakh per day by 2011 were estimated for the entire line from Central Secretariat to HUDA City Centre. The ridership of the line from Qutab Minar to HUDA City Centre has been fairly good. But we did not have any expected ridership targets for the line, said a DMRC spokesperson. However,Metro officials said things will see a sea change once the line is linked to Central Secretariat by the end of July. As of now very few office-goers are taking the service as getting feeder services from the stations is difficult. There are bus services from Qutab Minar station,but most other stations barely have any feeder services. When Newsline took a ride,the train had very few passengers,most of them tourists and students. This is our first Metro ride and instead of taking the other routes which are usually overcrowded we decided to take this one. We could see the Qutab Minar,though from a distance. The view is great with the line crossing malls and heritage structures, said Ravi Sharma,who was on a round trip with his family. DMRC said the terminal stations of Qutab Minar and HUDA City Centre as well as the MG Road metro station,which is flanked by malls,have seen the most foot falls on the line. At present,six trains run on the line at a frequency of 10 minutes. However,DMRC will increase the frequency to three minutes with 60 trains once it is connected to the main line. Meanwhile,work on the Central Secretariat-Qutab Minar is on in full swing and the line is scheduled to open by the end of July. Signalling and trial runs will begin soon on the stretch.
