Dubai's RTA lifts 346.5m passengers in 2011

Total of 346.5 million passengers used public transport in Dubai last year, Mattar Al Tayer, chairman and executive director of the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) has announced. The passenger figures compared with 332 million passengers lifted in 2010, a 4.3 percent rise,  according to the figures released by the RTA's statistics section. The average number of daily riders on Dubai's public transport system reached 963,000 compared to 922,000 in 2010, the RTA said. "The RTA has been endeavouring to upgrade the mass transit systems to make them the ideal choice of people in the Emirate," said Al Tayer in a statement released on Saturday. "These efforts come in implementation of RTA strategic objective of minimising the use of private vehicles and maximising the use of public transit means (including taxis) from 13 percent in 2006 to 30 percent in 2030," he said. He added that by the middle of last year, the usage rate had jumped to 19 percent, up foru percent from 2010. He said the Dubai Metro had lifted more than 69 million passengers in 2011, with the Red Line lifting 60 million passengers. The Green Line, which was launched in September, carried nearly nine million passengers. A total of 107.4 million people used public buses last year, an average of about 298,000 passengers per day while more than 14 million passengers used marine transit modes, which include abras, water bus and water taxis. Taxis made 62.36 million trips lifting about 155.9 million passengers in 2011, the RTA added. "The huge investments injected by the Dubai Government for the development of the infrastructure of transport sector have proved both successful and effective," Al Tayer said.