The Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS) has been a hit with Amdavadis if the number of people using the service and the income from the same is an indication. However, all is not well with the most ambitious urban transport project of Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC). For, it is facing some serious troubles as far as maintenance of the corridors and bus shelters is concerned.

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The civic body has invested crores to build roads and bus shelters for the service but lack of proper maintenance is creating a headache for civic body officials. The opposition in the AMC feels that if this continues the service itself may get derailed.

"Maintenance is most important part of any urban transport service and people will be demoralised if the service that was promised to them is not delivered," said Badruddin Shaikh, leader of opposition in the AMC.

He said that once the Ahmedabad Municipal Transport Service (AMTS) was also one of the best in its category but lack of maintenance brought it to its present state.

"The BRTS may also end up with the same fate due to lack of maintenance," said Shaikh, Faulty doors of bus shelters.The Ahmedabad Janmarg Ltd (AJL) put in place state-of-the-art door system at various bus shelters on BRTS corridor. A single door fitted at a bus shelter cost anywhere between Rs1.5 lakh to Rs2 lakh. Once the bus is parked by aligning it to the door of the bus shelter, the door opens and closes automatically ensuring safety of he commuters.

However, around 40% of the doors at various bus shelters do not close or open on their own. This problem plagues bus shelters at various places such as Manekbaug, Dharnidhar, Danilimda and Khodiayarnagar among others. The door system has been out of order for a long time and so far complaints have fallen on deaf ears, said sources in AJL. Sources said that two companies have been given contract of maintaining the automatic door system, but they have failed to perform their duties. "The two companies are not following the protocol for maintenance resulting in problem for the commuters," said sources.

When contacted Utpal Padia, executive director of AJL said he was not aware of the issue. He blamed the commuters attempt to manually open the doors for the damage.

Cave-ins on corridorThe civic body has spent around Rs6.2 crore per kilometer on an average to build the road for the BRTS corridor. However, several cave-ins were reported on these roads despite the civic body's claim that latest technology was used to build the same.

During the monsoon season five cave-ins appeared on BRTS corridor including one each at Shah-E-Alam, Bhairavnath, Mira Cinema. The civic body officials blamed the age-old drainage system instead of poor quality construction work for the cave-ins.

The worst part is that cave-in near Mira Cinema has not been repaired despite more than one and a half months of the incident. As a result the bus has to pass through mixed traffic at this point.

The repair work on the cave-ins is the duty of the assistant city engineers of the respective zone. "However, despite complaints to the engineering department of the south zone, the work is still incomplete," said Padia. On the other hand, additional city engineer of south zone KN Parikh blamed the lack of skilled manpower for delay in work. "We have only one person with knowledge of vertical sinking technology. He was busy with work at other spot and we did not want to dig the road," said Parikh. He assured that the work will be completed within a week.

Water logging in corridorDespite lack of heavy rains water-logging took place at more than a dozen spots on the BRTS corridor. The major water-logging spots on the corridor include Helmet Circle to Blind Peoples' Association, Maninagar, Khodiarnagar, Danilimda, sub-ways at Leelanagar and Geeta-Gauri Cinema to name a few.

As per the original design of BRTS corridor, the corridors should have been at least two inch higher compared to mixed traffic road. Moreover, a proper drainage system also needs to be in place. According to sources in AJL, water logging is a result of improper surfacing as well as due to the problem of alignment of the road.

No contractor to maintain corridor and sheltersBroken glass doors of bus shelters, missing railings and broken barricades are common at several places on the BRTS corridor in the city. These have not been repaired as there are hardly any takers for the maintenance contract of BRTS corridors and bus shelters. The civic body had twice invited tenders fore the same but the contractors have not shown any interest. The scope of work includes repairing damage due to public nuisance also.