Officials say Noida-G Noida metro link is ahead of schedule

Officials of the Noida Metro Rail Corporation (NMRC) on Thursday said around 70% work on four of the 21 metro stations for the under-construction Noida-Greater Noida metro link is completed. Officials said that the total work on the metro link is 45% complete.

Officials of the Noida Metro Rail Corporation (NMRC) on Thursday said around 70% work on four of the 21 metro stations for the under-construction Noida-Greater Noida metro link is completed. Officials said that the total work on the metro link is 45% complete.

Santosh Yadav, MD of NMRC, visits Sector 71 metro station on Thursday. (HT Photo)

Santosh Yadav, managing director of NMRC, inspected 9 under-construction metro stations. He was accompanied by officials of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC).

The inspection started around 9.30am from Noida’s Sector 71 Metro station site and ended at 1.30 pm at the Greater Noida’s Depot site, where work on staff quarters is underway.

“Work on four metro stations in sectors 71, 137, Knowledge Park-II and Alpha-I is 70% completed. Work on five metro stations sites I visited today is around 40%-50% done. We aim to complete structural work of all 21 metro stations by 2016-end,” Santosh Yadav, MD of NMRC, said.

DMRC and NMRC officials said that the under-construction 30- km metro link will be opened ahead of schedule, as it is 45% complete.

Officials said the 9-km stretch of this link will be completed before July for trials.

“We are procuring trains from China for this metro project and we have already signed an agreement for this project. We will procure trains from China in June to make way for conducting trials on a 9-km stretch in Greater Noida in July 2017 ,” Yadav said.

NMRC is also emphasising to make this 30-km metro link economically viable so that it can run its operations without any financial hassle.

“We are planning to develop commercial space at most of the 21 metro stations so that we can earn revenue by leasing the space. Apart from this, we are also planning to auction advertising space at metro stations once the link becomes operational, for additional revenue ,” PD Upadhyay, general manager (finance) of NMRC, said.