The citizens of Ahmedabad have something to cheer about as the fares of AMTS are not likely to rise this year. Moreover, with more buses to be introduced, passengers will be able to get better facilities, as per the Rs261 crore budget presented by the transport manager of Ahmedabad Municipal Transport Service (AMTS), transport body of Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC).
The transport body would introduce 400 new buses in its fleet. It has also been decided that 250 diesel buses will be off the roads with the introduction of new CNG buses. People of the city
have some respite as they would get better frequency of buses with increasing number of buses without any rise in fare. "We have decided not to introduce any hike in the fares of AMTS buses," said Praveen Patel, chairman of AMTS.
The transport manager has estimated income of Rs69 crore from 450 buses to be put on the road, while around 383 buses owned by private players are estimated to fetch around Rs57.84 crore. Total expenditure including capital and revenue expenditure is expected to remain at Rs261.18 crore during the financial year 2010-11. AMTS expects loan of Rs134 crore from its parent body AMC, said MS Patel, transport manager of AMTS.
AMTS expects to put around 833 buses on the roads in the next financial year including 450 buses from its own fleet and 383 buses from private players. At present, around 731 buses are on the roads that fetches average income of Rs26 lakh per day for AMTS.
