NEW DELHI: In its quest to decongest the roads of Delhi and make public use public transport more, on Wednesday, Delhi’s Transport Minister Mr. Haroon Yusuf flagged of 500 radio taxis. At the flag of ceremony the transport minister said that Delhi government is planning to increase the number of Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC) buses to 6000 and that of radio taxis to 5,000.

The Transport minister further added that government is also exploring other options to improve the public transport system in the capital. One such option is of introducing the monorail system. He went on to add that this monorail project had been approved in principle by the Delhi Cabinet, the mode of execution of the project would be decided now and the expression of interest would be floated by July.

The Transport minister went on to add that the idea behind all these projects is to improve the public transport system of Delhi, because the road space was limited. The launch of radio taxis are also part of this plan and their number are expected to increase from around 2,000 at present to 5,000 by 2009, he added. Likewise by then the DTC fleet would have doubled from 3,000 buses at present at around 6,000.

So, that when the city gets ready to host the Commonwealth Games in 2010, Delhi will have an efficient and robust public transport system in place.