KARACHI, May 4: The federal steering committee would hold a meeting to discuss demand and supply gap of buses in Karachi.

Well-placed sources in the city government said the committee, led by Planning and Development Commission Director, would soon hold its third meeting about the mass transit projects.

The city government’s mass transit department in its study on Bus Demand and Supply Analysis stated that Karachi was facing shortage of 5,695 buses at present.

The demand calculations as per study report revealed that even if existing 2,500 old busses were not phased out, 3,722 new busses would be required to meet the demand of commuters.

In case older buses and minibuses are phased out and the commuters of remote areas are catered, the demand of new buses would increase to 7,444.

On supply side, similar analysis stated that 2,991 passenger buses and 7,168 minibuses (equivalent to 3,584 large busses) which makes a total fleet size of 6,575 buses were present on different routes in the city.

Under the scrap programme, the buses registered before 1985 would be scraped reducing the existing fleet size from 6,575 to 2,332 buses. As per criteria, only 75 per cent of them (1,749) could be run on roads efficiently. Hence, the demand of 7,444 buses against supply of 1,749 crafted a gap of total 5695 buses.—PPI