Hyderabad: In a rare positive during times of despair, the TSRTC’s city buses, which met with a lukewarm response on the resumption of services in September, are now witnessing growing patronage from passengers with overall occupancy registering a steady rise.
According to TSRTC officials, passenger occupancy in the city buses has now gone up over 50 percent and is expected to improve further once offices and educational institutes reopen. On average, TSRTC’s Greater Hyderabad Zone (GHZ) is registering occupancy of 50 to 53 percent a day. The corporation is also increasing the operations depending on the response from passengers, a senior official said.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the RTC had suspended operations for over six months and resumed services on 39 main routes in the city on September 25. As a precautionary measure, RTC authorities were instructed to confine operations in city buses to 25 percent.
V Venkateshwarlu, Executive Director (GHZ) said the initial response was very low. “We initially registered occupancy of 12 to 15 percent a day. Now occupancy has touched 50 percent,” he said, adding that the public was slowly beginning to prefer RTC buses, which in turn has helped in improving daily revenue in the city. “We are recording revenue of Rs 1.25 crore a day. Before the lockdown, the overall revenue in the city was around Rs 3.3 crore a day,” Venkateshwarlu said.
According to officials, around 900 to 1,000 buses including mofussil services were being operated daily in GHZ. RTC was instructed to increase bus operations beyond 25 percent only when the occupancy touched 75 percent. Apart from city services, buses going from Hyderabad to districts including Warangal, Yadadri-Bhongir, and Karimnagar too are witnessing good patronage. The corporation is also registering an improvement in overall revenue with the resumption of inter-state buses between Telangana and AP.
Bus pass facility extended:
The TSRTC is providing an opportunity for the extension of the bus pass facility to the extent of the number of days lost due to the lockdown for general commuters. This facility has been extended for those who have not utilized their bus passes such as Ordinary, Metro Express, Metro Deluxe, Greater Hyderabad, Airport Pushpak AC during the lockdown.
Such bus pass commuters were requested to utilize the opportunity by submitting their old pass (Id card, ticket) at bus pass counters seeking an extension of the number of the lost days while obtaining new bus passes. This facility has to be availed on or before November 30.
The RTC is providing bus pass facility in 15 counters across the city including at Rathifile, Uppal, Dilsukhnagar, Medchal, Afzalgunj, and Mehdipatnam.
