Political Pressure Stalls CNG Bus Service Launch

ISLAMABAD: The launch of CNG bus service in town has hit snags. The project was expected to take off in the middle of last month but this couldn’t happen reportedly because of intense pressure by certain quarters of the current political dispensation on the CDA bosses.

The CDA Board, the highest decision-making body at the authority, had many meetings in the recent past but the project didn’t come under discussion.An official said that the CDA’s Project Management Office (PMO) had fulfilled the project’s all legal formalities and was anxiously awaiting the green light to it.

He said that the CNG bus service was one of many vital projects, which had been put on ice since the new government’s formation. He acknowledged that any more delays in the service’s launch would add to the misery of twin city residents already suffering from limited transport facilities.Under the plan, Midway Consortium is to initially put 50 CNG-run buses on the city roads, with the number gradually swelling to reach 300.

The CDA will facilitate the service’s launch and its subsequent operations.The authority has already allotted a plot measuring 21 acres in I-11 to Midway Consortium for establishing a bus terminal for the new service. The terminal will have a CNG station, a hotel, passengers’ facilitation centre and other necessary facilities. He said that a board of directors of the joint venture, consisting of the CDA and Midway Consortium representatives, would oversee the bus service. He said that the board would decide fare for these CNG buses.

The official said that other inter-city and intra-city transport companies would also be allowed to use the bus terminal on payment. He said that the board would decide the fee in this respect. He agreed that Islamabad and Rawalpindi currently had no proper bus service. He said that private vans, wagons, minibuses and coaches plying 16 routes of the two cities were unable to cater to the needs of commuters travelling between Islamabad and Rawalpindi.

The official said that private companies and transporters had put on the twin city roads around 1,800 coaches, vans and wagons on major routes but they were too little in number compared with the passengers load.