A year on, Monorail notches up a milestone of 50 lakh riders

Ridership
Monorail's ridership has crossed the 50 lakh mark as of the last week of January. That is, an average of around 14,000 people rode the rail daily in the last one year. Interestingly, the uniqueness of the system has still not waned among Mumbaikars.
"As on January 30, the total ridership on Mumbai Monorail stood at 50,96,345. This means that we achieved the milestone of 50 lakh commuters in a year's time," said K Vijayalakshmi, additional chief, transport and communication division, Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA).
As per the statistics available with dna, the highest ridership was witnessed in the month of May when a total of 4,83,511 people took a ride on the system. Incidentally, this was at the peak of summer vacations and the Monorail was still a unique mode of transport among the people. Additionally, starting April 15, the authorities extended the operation hours from the earlier 6.45am-3pm to 6am-8pm. From August 15, the operational hours were extended further up to 10pm.
Data shared by the MMRDA shows that the 8.93-km-long system has now stabilised in terms of ridership. The daily average ridership is in the range of over 14,000 to around 15,000.
In November, the average daily ridership was 15,751 as compared to 14,948 in December, whereas in January it was 14,478.
Possibly, Mumbai Monorail being India's first and only, it is visited by locals and tourists who look forward to a joyride on it, specially on the less crowded weekends. The average weekend ridership is 16,699 as against 13,072 daily on weekdays.
As reported by dna on September 29, 2014, Monorail is now part of the 'Mumbai Darshan' itinerary of some tour organisers.
Another set of figures shows that the Chembur Monorail station has the highest ridership at around 5,500 daily, whereas the least footfall has been seen at VNP-RC Marg and Bhakti Park stations with just 700 commuters. As on January 28, Fertiliser Township had 2,200 people boarding the Monorail, but Bharat Petroleum and Wadala Depot stations attracted higher numbers at around 3,300 and 2,650 commuters respectively.

PASSENGER SURVEY
A study conducted by the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) on the travel pattern of commuters using the Mumbai Monorail system showed that 73% of the passengers are regular users.
The study was conducted to know the preferences as well as opinion of the commuters as well as to understand the travel pattern of the system post-inauguration.
"The patronage for Monorail has increased, as 73% of the commuters travel daily on it as compared to the 21% who prefer to use it once a month. Only 6% of the travellers opt for Monorail on a weekly basis," said PRK Murthy, head of transport and communication division in MMRDA.
According to the study report, 46% of the passengers board Monorail to go to work, whereas 25% comprise students who head to educational institutes along the corridor. Similarly, around 3% of the commuters prefer Monorail to travel on work .
The data indicates that 7% of the commuters prefer taking Monorail for recreation purpose, whereas 2% of the ridership is of those individuals who head for shopping.
A break-up of commuter profile by age group showed that 33% of commuters fall in the 16-22 age group; 29% are between 23 and 30 years old. There ia same percentage in the age bracket of 31-58 years. Senior citizens comprised of only 2%, but 7% of the travellers belonged to 0-15 age range.

Majority of the monorail commuters walk to the station and walk till their respective destinations, 70% of the individuals walked till the monorail stations and 73% of them walked to their destinations. The survey showed that 11% of the riders reached monorail stations by public bus and 8% of the lot boarded a bus after getting off from monorail. Likewise, 9% and 7% of the passengers came and left from monorail stations by auto rickshaws respectively. Whereas, remaining 10% of the passengers came and left by taxi, suburban train or private vehicles to their respective destinations.

ESCALATORS
After a long wait, monorail commuters would finally get to use escalators at all the seven stations between 8.93-km long Chembur-Wadala Depot route.

"At the moment, installation has been completed and operation of escalators has begun at all the stations except VNP-RC Marg and Bharat Petroleum monorail stations," said Vishnu Kumar, Director, Mumbai Monorail.

The delay in installation of the escalators at Bharat Petroleum and VNP-RC Marg stations is due to road digging road that is underway. Escalators at these two locations are likely to be completed later in February.

The schedule to complete installation has been revised on multiple occasions. As per the initial plan, it was to be ready for public use from June onwards, but the same was later put off to October, followed by the deadline of November and December due to technical issues.

At each of the stations, four escalators will be put up. Two of these will be at the ground level to the concourse while two more will be from the concourse to the platforms. Therefore, the seven stations between Chembur and Wadala Depot will have a total of 28 escalators to enter and exit from the monorail stations.
Comfortable and cheap
Mumbai: In November 2013, the Mumbai Monorail fares were revised but lowered making it perhaps one of the cheapest modes of air-conditioned travel in the world.
When the construction of the project had commenced, in February 2009, the minimum fare was pegged at Rs8 and maximum at Rs20. In November 2013, the fares were finalised, with minimum fare being Rs5 and maximum Rs19, which will be for a commute of more than 20km.

The initial proposal was that the monorail fares were supposed to be 1.5 times that of Brihanmumbai Electric Supply and Transport (BEST) Undertaking's ticket price. This means, the minimum charge should have been Rs9 as the BEST charges a minimum fare of Rs6.

On the other hand, the MMRDA and Reliance Infrastructure have locked horns over the fare issue for Mumbai Metro between Versova-Andheri-Ghatkopar. The state wants it to be lowered, whereas the private body wants to retain the higher denomination of Rs10-20-30-40.

Once the second phase is ready up to Jacob Circle or Sant Gadge Maharaj Chowk, commuters will have to pay a maximum among of Rs15 for end-to-end travel in Mumbai Monorail.

SATIS
When a presentation was made to the state and traffic authorities on how the areas around the Mumbai Monorail stations can be decongested and reorganised for unhindered vehicular movement, the state authorities were doubtful if the Station Area Traffic Improvement Scheme (SATIS) will really give desired results.
But now, after a year since the opening of the Monorail line, the fact is it has somewhat helped in reducing traffic on the road below apart from not blocking movement of traffic below the monorail stations.
In all there are seven stations along the corridor, namely, Wadala Depot, Bhakti Park, Mysore Colony, Bharat Petroleum, Fertiliser Township, VN Purav-RC Marg and Chembur.

"The width of the pavements below the monorail stations was increased to 1.5 metres to have more room for passenger and pedestrian movement. Moreover, bus stops were moved to 50 metres from the station landings ensuring no to congest the spot where station landings exist," said S P Khade, Technical Director, MMRDA.

Additionally, bylanes and side streets were made only to park bicycles and motorised two wheelers. No space has been designed to park four-wheelers inside the influence zone of SATIS. Vehicles if parked, gets towed away.

Railings were installed on the pavement edges to the length of 40 metres only to discourage commuters from jay walking.

VISITORS LIST
Mumbai Monorail has become a showcase project. Everyone wants to visit it, right from school students to technical institutions to officials from other states and government bodies.

In all 26,600 students visited Mumbai Monorail in the last one year as part of their day long educational visit or excursion. These 26,600 children were part of 181 schools in and around Mumbai.

Similarly, visits were arranged for monorail system by 12 technical institutional centres for their students.

Whereas, foreign and Indian government representatives were part of the visitor's team to study monorail system.

The government officials include the 'Metro Man' E Sreedharan who has Delhi Metro and Konkan Railway to his credit.

Even senior management of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation and Secretary of Union Ministry of Urban Development gave India's first monorail a look to understand if the same can be replicated at other cities of India.

"Urban planners, local authorities and railway officers too were shown various aspects of the project for their understanding," said an MMRDA official.

AVERAGE DAILY RIDERSHIP : 14,079
AVERAGE WEEKEND RIDERSHIP : 16,699
AVERAGE WEEKDAY RIDERSHIP : 13,072
HIGHEST PASSENGERS : Station /
LEAST PASSENGERS : Station /

STATION WISE AVERAGE DAILY RIDERSHIP
Chembur : 5,500
VNP-RC Marg : 700
Bhakti Park : 700
Fertiliser Township : 2,200
Bharat Petroleum : 3,300
Wadala Depot : 2,650
Mysore Colony : 1,000

73% of the monorail commuters are regular users
84% of the monorail commuters prefer extended services up to 11 pm
83% of the monorail commuters asked for return tokens
53% of the monorail commuters want frequency to be increased between 6 to 10 minutes
70% of the monorail commuters walk to monorail stations
33% of the monorail commuters in the age group of 16-22 years
29% of the monorail commuters in each age group of 23-30 years and 31-58 years

MONORAIL FARE
KMS FARE (Rs)
0-3 5
3-5 7
5-7 9
7-10 11
10-15 14
15-20 15
>20 19