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The projected Film City and the future Noida International Airport will be linked by India’s first pod taxi service, launched by the Yamuna Expressway Industrial Development Authority (YEIDA). The authority has recently authorized the bid document and changed the DPR for this big project, which will launch soon.
Using compact, automated, electric, and autonomous automobiles that can seat up to six passengers, the pod taxi service will provide rapid, personalized transport (PRT) to its customers. These vehicles will transport riders on demand via a system of elevated tracks called dedicated guideways.
Starting in Film City in Sector 21, this service will go 14.6 kilometers through places like Handicraft Park, Apparel Park, MSME Park in Sector 29, industrial units in Sector 32, and Toy Park in Sector 33. There will be 12 stops along the route, and the ride will take at most 20 minutes at a maximum speed of 40 kilometers per hour in the pod taxis.
There will be 690 pods installed along the corridor, with the first phase including 101 pods with seating for six. Construction will take two years, bringing the total construction time to four. The concession period will be 35 years.
The Indian Port Rail and Ropeway Corporation Limited (IPRRC) collaborated with YEIDA to provide a revised DPR for the project, which indicates that at 14.6 km, the proposed PRT project will be the longest of its kind in the world. The analysis also compared five other pod taxi projects worldwide, transporting more than 1 billion passengers per kilometer with only one safety issue. Moreover, the survey found that Morgantown, USA, has the longest and oldest PRT service at 13.2 km. In contrast, Tianfu Airport, Chengdu, China, has the second-longest PRT system at 9.7 km, which began operations in 2022.
The bid document (concession agreement and RFP) would soon be ready to be given to the bid-evaluation committee, according to YEIDA CEO Arun Vir Singh. The authority hopes to begin accepting bids by June so the pod taxi service may begin operating shortly and link the airport with the Film City in Noida. Public-private partnerships will be used to carry out the project.
