For sightseeing tours, three more buses on the way

Double-deckers likely to arrive in January; will allow TDCP to carry 325 passengers at a time

LAHORE: The Sightseeing Lahore service has acquired three more double-decker buses for its citywide tours. The sightseeing initiative is the country’s first bus service for tourists that was inaugurated in November last year.

The vehicles are expected to arrive in Lahore in January. The new buses will enable the Tourism Development Corporation of Punjab (TDCP) to carry over 300 passengers at a time.



TDCP Managing Director Ahmar Malik said the service had elicited a favourable response from local and international tourists.

“Around 100,000 tourists have used the double-decker buses since the service was inaugurated on November 25, 2015,” he said. The corporation currently has two and has ordered three more buses to expand the frequency of the tourist bus service.

Road to expansion

The TDCP has managed to organise hundreds of trips for the corporate sector, schools and the public despite having only two buses. It has been receiving a large number of tourists from Karachi, Islamabad, Rawalpindi and Peshawar.

Ahmar said a large number of schoolchildren from Karachi, Islamabad and Gilgit-Baltistan had also availed the service. The corporation receives countless inquiries about the service every day from across the country. Sightseers from Faisalabad, Gujranwala, Multan and various parts of Sindh frequently use the service.

The TDCP also plans to expand its route network and enhance the frequency of the bus service. The key decisions have yet to be taken to give effect to these plans.

New public buses to hit Lahore's roads

Temporarily halted

The TDCP initiated the process of importing three new double-deckers buses in March to expand its fleet. The vehicles were to arrive by June.

However, social activists vehemently opposed the decision and filed a public interest petition in the Lahore High Court. The activists wanted the corporation to procure buses from local vendors and not spend foreign exchange on importing vehicles.

The import of the buses was, thus, temporarily halted.

International standards

Ahmar said the Sightseeing Lahore service was modelled along the lines of similar initiatives operating in London and Dubai and the corporation gave priority to maintaining international standards.

The TDCP imported its earlier two tailor-made buses from Volvo, a firm which has been owned by a multinational company in China since 2010.According to the managing director, each bus has a capacity to accommodate 67 passengers. The vehicles are equipped with a public address system that allows tour guides to inform sightseers about the sites.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 21^st, 2016.