Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Mahmood Khan announced at a news conference that all the arrangements for the inauguration of the project, a gift from Pakistan Tehrik Insaaf Government for people of Peshawar have been finalized.
ISLAMABAD: (UrduPoint/Pakistan Point News-August 13th, 2020) Prime Minister Imran Khan will inaugurate Peshawar Bus Rapid Transit today.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Mahmood Khan announced at a news conference that all the arrangements for the inauguration of the project, a gift from Pakistan Tehrik Insaaf Government for people of Peshawar have been finalized.
According to Radio Pakistan, the BRT built at the cost around 70 billion rupees, will bring revolution in the provincial capital's transport system as approximately 340,000 common people will enjoy a safe, comfortable and affordable travel in luxury buses on daily basis.
The BRT is a 27.5 kilometer-long main corridor track with 31 stations, besides seven feeder routes of total 62 kilometers with 146 stops to facilitate hundreds of thousands of passengers every day.
The inaugural ceremony is likely to be attended by Governors of Sindh and Khyber Pakhunkhwa, Federal and provincial ministers, advisers and special assistants, and other senior government officials.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Mahmood said the BRT Peshawar would provide state of the art travelling facility to people at affordable fare in the provincial capital.
The BRT project consists of a 27.5 kilometers main track with 31 stations while the length of the feeder routes is 62 kilometers and has 146 stops.
The main track was connected to seven different areas of the city which will provide easy travel to the people. Approximately 60,000 Zu travelling cards were sold in just four days and three mega commercial plazas would be completed in June 2021. However, the bus parking areas were ready.
The PDA gave a route and stations to Trans Peshawar which already completed installation of Intelligence Ticking System (ITS).
The sources said that initial estimate for the BRT project was Rs49.43 billion, but the cost of the revised PC-1 had increased to Rs66.43 billion, which was further increased to Rs 70 billion. The Asian Development Bank and AFD had provided $593 million loan for the project, while the remaining amount was provided by the provincial government.
The estimated cost of BRT's civil work (27km track and stations), depots and ITS has increased from Rs32,863 million to Rs52,446 million. Expenditure on parking plazas and off corridor facilities has increased from Rs 95 million to Rs320 million. Bike sharing facility has cost Rs132 million. ADB's financial charges, supervision cost and advertisement expenditures have increased from Rs493 million to Rs1,156 million.
Amount for the purchase of land was reduced from Rs2,213 million to Rs1,620 million. An amount of Rs7,875 million was allocated for the purchase of new busses which was decreased to Rs7,475 million. As per ADB directives, Rs1,375 million were allocated for contingencies.
It may be mentioned here that Bus Rapid Transit project was inaugurated in October 2017 by the then chief minister Pervaiz Khattak who promised to complete it in six months it took three years to complete and now was going to be inaugurated.
