The Brihanmumbai Electric Supply & Transport (BEST) Undertaking will replace low floor ferry buses with 33 new ones without a conductor.
The new 33 buses will be ultra-low floor ones and BEST officials are trying to include pneumatic doors in which the driver himself will open and shut the door of the bus with a lever next to it.
“We are trying to get those buses that open up on air-pressure and do not require a conductor. We are still trying to go about how to do that.
“These buses are seen abroad and can be introduced on certain routes,” said Jagdish Patil, general manager, BEST.
The current 40 ferry buses run on approximately 500 routes in the city of Mumbai and mostly from Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST) to Nariman Point etc.
The BEST has been toying with the idea since almost a year, but still has to figure out as to how the commuter would pay the money.
“The only problem implementing it in Mumbai as compared to leading metropolitan cities around the world is that there is no guarantee that the commuter here will pay the exact fare in all honesty, which is extremely vital for this experiment to work,” said an official, on condition of anonymity.
These 30 low-floor buses, as well as 303 non-air-conditioned buses will be sold in scrap by the BEST in the coming two-months.
