Technical and operational hassles plague Delhi Metro’s plans of making its services better on the high-speed Airport link. It is expected to take a long time to be resolved. DMRC management is facing problems while increasing frequency on the corridor due to shortage of trains, technical obstructions.
The interval between two trains, though has been reduced to 10 minutes, cannot be reduced further due to shortage of trains.
Apart from this, no decision on fare revision, dispute with Reliance Infrastructure, bank debts, connectivity and many such issues seem to have crippled the Delhi Metro’s management and it does not have any immediate solution.
After taking over the Airport link’s operations, DMRC sought suggestions and complaints from the commuters. Delhi Metro, though, has implemented some of the suggestions; technical hassles prevent it from bringing all the suggestions in practice.
Even though the headway between the trains on the Airport link has been reduced from 15 minutes to 10.30 minutes from August 1, the frequency of the trains on the corridor cannot be increased further.
Delhi Metro maintains a peak-hour frequency of three minutes on other corridors, but the same cannot be replicated on the Airport line due to shortage of trains.
With the peak-hour frequency becoming 10.30 minutes, six trains were kept for operations, one on standby and only one train in the depot.
Another big challenge that the Delhi Metro is facing is the connectivity of the corridor and making it more accessible to the masses, as the low ridership on the corridor accounts for losses incurred by DMRC. Metro chief Mangu Singh said that it is only after the settlement of the bank loans that DMRC will take some big decisions for the convenience of commuters.