Tendering for e-buses’ maintenance/charging depot within fortnight, land handover complete

As part of its electric-bus (e-bus) project, Ghaziabad agencies will likely begin issuing tenders for the maintenance depot and charging station for the 50 buses

As part of its electric-bus (e-bus) project, Ghaziabad agencies will likely begin issuing tenders for the maintenance depot and charging station for the 50 buses it is slated to receive. Once the tenders are issued and winning firms finalised, it should take about four months for completion.

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The E-bus project was cleared by the UP cabinet in October last year for intra-city commute. Ghaziabad was among the 14 cities selected for the project. Scheduled to have been completed this month, however, the project ran into many hurdles not least of which was the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Initially the land (measuring about 26,000 square metres, sqm) for the charging station/maintenance depot for the buses was identified in Bonjha. But the presence of many high tension power lines forced us to cancel it. Now, we have received possession of about 25,000 sqm in Akbarpur-Behrampur at the Ghaziabad-Greater Noida link road,” said Umesh Shukla, the project manager from the Construction & Design Services (C&DS), a unit of UP Jal Nigam tasked with developing the charging station.

The entire project of the construction of the charging station/maintenance depot is estimated at ₹10 crore, 25% of which will be paid by the municipal corporation.

“Once we get funds from the municipal-corporation, we will start the tendering process within a fortnight. Thereafter, it will take around four months to complete the project. The depot will have charging bays, maintenance and parking facilities for the e-buses,” he added.

“We have started the process to provide the funds. The land handover at Akbarpur-Behrampur has also been given to the Jal Nigam (C&DS),” said MS Tanwar, municipal-commissioner.

Six routes have been identified for the service– Anand Vihar to Muradnagar, Anand Vihar to ALT Centre, Dilshad Garden to Govindpuram, Dilshad Garden to Lal Kuan and Govindpuram police line to Noida City Centre besides Tila Morh to New Bus Stand.

“Presently, there is no mode of intra-city travel by government buses. As a result, thousands of daily commuters including girls and women either use their own vehicles or forced to use shared autos. If the project is slotted to get complete next year, it would mean that the polluted conditions on city roads will continue to prevail this winter season as well,” said Colonel (retired) TP Tyagi, president of flat owners’ federation.

Earlier in August last year, the Department of Heavy Industries had approved the sanction of 5595 e-buses to 64 cities, state governments, state transport undertakings for intra-city and inter-city operations while 600 of these were approved for 11 cities of Uttar Pradesh including 50 buses for Ghaziabad city.

The approval was made under the phase II of the Faster Adoption and Manufacturing of (Hybrid &) Electric Vehicles in India scheme in order to push for clean mobility in public transportation.

The buses were proposed to run about 4 billion kilometres during their contract period and expected to cumulatively save about 1.2 billion litters of fuel over the contract period, which will result into avoidance of 2.6 million tonnes of CO2 (carbon dioxide) emission.