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Commuters give two thumbs up for new Dubai Metro stations

Dubai - Now that the new Route 2020 stations are open, she’s certain countless residents have found relief.

Dubai Metro user Hafsa Zaheer used to live in Discovery Gardens and knew how tough the commute could get from the neighbourhood.

Now that the new Route 2020 stations are open, she’s certain countless residents have found relief.

“Before, if we had to ride the Metro (from Discovery Gardens), we had to go to the Ibn Battuta station. And it used to get so crowded.

The opening of these stations will help a lot, as there are residential areas there and quite a number of students live there as well,” said Hafsa, who just moved to Barsha Heights last week.

Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) on Friday opened the four new Metro stations — Jebel Ali, The Gardens, Discovery Gardens and Al Furjan — with the first journey departing from Jebel Ali at 10am. These new additions are part of the RTA’s Route 2020 Metro extension and all commuters were quite excited about the opening, which adds to Dubai’s amazing public transport system.

As soon as the stations opened, a number of curious residents walked in and hopped into the train just to experience the new route.

Expat Indu Tripathi said: “The Dubai Metro has never failed to live up to commuters’ expectations. I have been living in Dubai over the past 10 years now and have seen it evolve with time and become more accessible. The new routes will help facilitate transport to new locations like Al Furjan and even the Jebel Ali Metro station. It will help people working in those areas travel conveniently. Kudos to RTA.”

Hafsa added that a lot of people were really waiting for the four stations to open. “It’s because it used to be tough to commute to those remote areas. This will also ease the crowd. And with the Expo coming up, it will help tourists as well. Now, they wouldn’t need to rent a car and will have easy access. It is a very smart decision by the RTA.”

Born and raised in Dubai, Hafsa has witnessed the birth of the Dubai Metro, which started operations in 2009. “When I joined university in 2010, I used to travel from Stadium to UAE Exchange. I had to switch buses and commuting was a bit hard as it used to take two hours. But with the Metro, the time taken to commute has reduced.”

David, a student from Nigeria, was thrilled to hear about the opening and plans to try it out today. “I’ve been here for 10 months now and this is brilliant. I stay in Marina and this will lower the cost of taxi fare. I also work part-time in real estate and I go to Al Fursan often. So, I used to spend too much money on taxis. And with the Expo coming up, it will make commuting easier.

“Dubai is doing great stuff. One of the reasons I moved to Dubai was because of the Expo. It will help foster relations between countries with Dubai being at the heart of it,” added the 24-year-old.

Meanwhile, Sanket Sarnobat, who hails from Mumbai, uses the public transport system regularly and was keen to ride to these new stations soon. “It is wonderful to start the year with something new. I’ve been here for five years now and I use the Metro regularly. Dubai has a wonderful public transport system and adding new stations will help a lot of commuters like us.”

“Though I haven’t been to those stations yet, I hope try the route in the coming week when I plan to meet my friends,” Sanket said.

james@khaleejtimes.com