KARACHI: Govt hires firm to prepare feasibility: KCR’s revival
By Arman Sabir
KARACHI, Nov 25: The Sindh government has issued a letter of intent to a private consultancy to work out the pros and cons for the revival of the Karachi Circular Railway.
“The private consultants have started exploring ways to prepare a future plan to revive the operation of the KCR,” a senior official in the provincial transport department told Dawn.
HE SAID: “The plan about the revival of the KCR will be presented to President Pervez Musharraf hopefully in the first month of next year.”
When this reporter pointed out that the presentation had been scheduled for December this year, the director general of the Karachi Mass Transit Programme, Dr Tahir Soomro, said the work could not be completed by the end of this year. “That is why the presentation of the plan will be made to the president in January,” he explained.
He said the government wanted a viable plan to revive the KCR as it was in the interest of the people of the city. About the consultancy, he said the government had invited bids from private companies. The bids had been evaluated and the letter of intent had been granted to the private firm.
The private consultancy would prepare short-term and long- term plans for the sustainable operation of the KCR. The provincial government had estimated Rs1 to 1.5 billion for the execution of the KCR operation on a short-term basis and had asked the federal government to sanction the amount, he added.
Besides, he said, no decision had yet been taken on the management of the operation of the KCR. Although the Pakistan Railways would provide the technical assistance, the city government did not have the capability to run the KCR alone.
In the past, several attempts had been made to entice the private sector without success owing to the absence of an attractive plan. “At present three suggestions are being considered. The first one is to run the KCR on a build-operate- transfer basis. The second one is to find a way to fully privatize the KCR and develop such a plan which can attract the private sector. The third one is to establish a commercial venture in the name of the Karachi Circular Railway Company having the provincial government, city government and the private sector as partners”, Dr Soomro disclosed.
All the three plans would be aimed at attracting the private sector to operate the KCR. The government wanted the involvement of the private sector for the sustainable operation of the circular railway. In addition, engineering design of the tracks was required.
He said the plan should be precise so that it could attract the private sector, adding that “we hope we would attract them”.
The sources said the KCR was a necessity of the metropolis as the existing public transport was not enough to meet the requirement of the Karachiites. They said 5,000 buses were still needed, which would not only add to air pollution but would also increase the volume of the vehicular traffic hampering the smooth traffic flow and raising the chances of road accidents.
The sources claimed that the federal government in its current fiscal budget had dropped the revival of the KCR operation, though when President Pervez Musharraf had visited Karachi in January last year it had been brought to his notice that the KCR operation had been suspended on Dec 15, 1999. On the directives of the president, several steps were being taken to make the KCR a viable project.
The sources said the KCR was to be re-launched from May 1, 2001, to provide fast, economical, environment-friendly and comfortable transport facility to the citizens of the metropolis by the new management of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) with the technical assistance of the Pakistan Railways under the supervision of the Sindh government. They said on replacing the KMC, it was the responsibility of the city government to take up the issue with the Pakistan Railways and the provincial government for the early revival of the KCR.
City Nazim Naimatullah Khan had said the newly-established city government was committed to the revival of the KCR in the city.
Analysts maintain that the government should revive the KCR because the provincial government has already spent over Rs3 billion to build flyovers on railway level-crossing in the city.
