ACCORDING to a recent Time magazine story titled ‘Second season’, London has 9,000 diesel buses that will be replaced gradually by green buses. With an effective underground train system which connects all suburbs with central London, the fact that there are 9,000 buses for a population of less than 10 million would surprise anyone in Karachi. The city has a population of about 20 million, has no underground train system, and yet the number of public transport buses, including minibuses and coaches, would not be beyond 10-15 per cent of what London has.

We are hearing about 100 new buses that are said to be on their way for the newly-constructed Green Line. Several hundred more are expected in due course.

However, they will not be able to serve the entire city. Having no underground trains, Karachi needs at least 20,000 buses.

The new city administrator should get in touch with London’s mayor and make an offer to buy the old buses that the city plans to discard. Converting them from diesel to LPG would be easy as it has already been done quite efficiently in India.

This will help us overcome the lack of public transport and provide some relief to the people who have been craving for a better transport system for long.

S. Nayyar Iqbal Raza
Karachi

Published in Dawn, August 27th, 2021