Mumbai: The city’s first underground Metro corridor between Colaba-Bandra-Seepz is likely to be a driverless line a year after the commissioning of the project in 2021.
The Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation (MMRC), which is building the 33.5-km-long underground corridor, on Thursday said that the rolling stocks (coaches) of the Metro corridor would be equipped with an advanced signalling system — communication-based train control (CBTC) — that would allow for driverless operation of the corridor.
Throwing light on corporation’s plans, A.A. Bhatt, director (systems), MMRC, said, “Initially the Metro will run with the help of a driver until the system is in place. Later, gradually we will remove drivers and they will be stationed at the control rooms where the computerised system would monitor the signalling of the Metro.”
Earlier in 2016, the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) got approval to have driverless Metro running. Currently, two corridors in Delhi have installed a similar system that will operate the 58-km-long Majlish Park-Shiv Vihar (Line 7) and the 38-km-long Janakpuri (West)- Botanical Garden (Line 8) corridors, which are a part of the third phase of Delhi Metro’s expansion.
According to an MMRC official, there are a total of 27 countries that operate driverless Metro corridors all around the globe.
Mr Bhatt, added, “The DMRC had to take clearances from the Union railway ministry for running a driverless Metro. Now, we would follow the guidelines followed by the DMRC for obtaining permissions for running the driverless Metro corridor.”
The Metro 3 will have 26 underground stations and will be a crucial north-south link where it will connect major central business districts (CBD) such as Nariman Point, Bandra-Kurla Complex (BKC) and Seepz in Andheri.
The project has been mired in controversy with the construction of a car depot at Aarey Colony and also after the residents of Girgaum and Kalbadevi protested the alignment of the project, citing their displacement.
