Karachi is Getting Bus Corridor Projects Worth $1 Billion

The World Bank (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) are financing projects worth $1 billion in Karachi to help modernize public transport, Bloomberg reported. The projects are for bus networks on dedicated lanes. Syed Awais Qadir Shah, Minister for Transport and Mass Transit for the province of Sindh, informed in an interview that the construction for the $550 million Red Line, funded by the ADB, will start as soon as this month, while the $455 million World Bank-funded design is scheduled to begin before the end of the year, Both projects will take two years to complete and will be funded in part by the provincial government, he said. The minister also informed that the ADB’s Red Line project would have 280 custom-built buses that will start on methane and switch to batteries while running. The provincial government plans to set up a biogas plant to produce methane from animal dung. Without sharing details on the bidders, the minister informed that the project has gotten bids from the world’s top firms and is in the final stages of evaluation.