<p>The Bengaluru Metro, better known as Namma Metro, is celebrating its seventh birthday today.<br /><br />From being a proposal of the DMRC to get a high-speed transit line for Bengaluru in 2003 to helping cut down travel time and cost for many Bengalureans today, the Metro has come a long way.<br /><br />Mired in delays, debates over feasibility and a very long battle with the rocky terrain of Bengaluru which obstructed constructed time and time again, the Metro today carries up to and even more than 3 lakh passengers a day across both Purple and Green Lines.<br /><br />Even today, however, the Metro faces countless challenges, both from within and outside its operation. Earlier this year, the Metro staff went to strike over a spat with police officials. Later, some Kannada activists began an all-out brawl to remove <a href="http://www.deccanherald.com/content/618828/bmrcl-gets-notice-hindi-signboards.html" target="_blank">'Hindi imposition</a>' from the stations, and have largely succeeded in their task and now, activists and BMRCL at loggerheads over shifting of the <a href="http://www.deccanherald.com/content/634834/activists-rebut-bmrcls-logic-behind.html" target="_blank">Cantonment station</a> in the Gottgere-Nagawara line.<br /><br />It has been a long road to reaching the current state that Namma Metro has achieved, becoming one of the main means of transport for lakhs of people of all ages, and the Phase 2 is expected to increase the ridership only more. The only thing remains to be seen if BMRCL can make the 2020 target for opening of operations across the lines by then.</p>
<p>The Bengaluru Metro, better known as Namma Metro, is celebrating its seventh birthday today.<br /><br />From being a proposal of the DMRC to get a high-speed transit line for Bengaluru in 2003 to helping cut down travel time and cost for many Bengalureans today, the Metro has come a long way.<br /><br />Mired in delays, debates over feasibility and a very long battle with the rocky terrain of Bengaluru which obstructed constructed time and time again, the Metro today carries up to and even more than 3 lakh passengers a day across both Purple and Green Lines.<br /><br />Even today, however, the Metro faces countless challenges, both from within and outside its operation. Earlier this year, the Metro staff went to strike over a spat with police officials. Later, some Kannada activists began an all-out brawl to remove <a href="http://www.deccanherald.com/content/618828/bmrcl-gets-notice-hindi-signboards.html" target="_blank">'Hindi imposition</a>' from the stations, and have largely succeeded in their task and now, activists and BMRCL at loggerheads over shifting of the <a href="http://www.deccanherald.com/content/634834/activists-rebut-bmrcls-logic-behind.html" target="_blank">Cantonment station</a> in the Gottgere-Nagawara line.<br /><br />It has been a long road to reaching the current state that Namma Metro has achieved, becoming one of the main means of transport for lakhs of people of all ages, and the Phase 2 is expected to increase the ridership only more. The only thing remains to be seen if BMRCL can make the 2020 target for opening of operations across the lines by then.</p>
