ISLAMABAD: The Central Development Working Party has cleared the Karachi Circular Railway Project (KCR) on Tuesday, worth Rs 292billion, in the meeting with the chairman, Federal Minister for Planning Development Ahsan Iqbal.

The project entails the construction of a 43-kilometer dual-track urban rail mass transit system expected to be constructed in a period of four years. it aims to provide reliable, safe, and environmentally friendly public transport to Karachi.

The 1.4-meter wide route starts from Drigh Road and passes through Gulshan-e-Iqbal, Federal B Area, Liaquatabad, North Nazimabad, Nazimabad, SITE and Lyari.

The project is a part of an overall scheme for the “improvement of transport infrastructure”, including road network, provision of public transport facilities, and traffic management.

The urban railway aims to counter transportation problems in Karachi and to meet the incremental demand over the last few decades due to the declining supply of large buses and the expanded population.

The meeting was attended by the secretary for the ministry of planning, the chief economist, officials of the railway ministry, and representatives from the Sindh government.

The scope of work includes the construction of horizontal and vertical curvature, roadway and railway cross-section elements, ramp gradients, and layout of structures with respect to the alignment.

Construction of stations, and the provision of drivers, informatory, regulatory, and warning signs, passenger facilitation signs along with allied facilities.

The project is expected to serve a daily ridership of 457,000 passengers per day which is expected to go up to one million per day in the future. The project will deploy the use of electric trains and will be operational for 7 days a week and 17 hours a day.

Thirty stations would be constructed under the project along the corridor covering the densely populated area of the city.