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It is easy to understand why everyone in India now wants a similar system. The government announced this month that 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) of metro lines have been built across the country. This is indeed remarkable, given that Indian towns have long struggled to build world-class public infrastructure. But the Delhi Metro is now one of the longest in the world — only Moscow, London and New York have larger networks outside mainland China — and 22 other Indian cities have metros in various stages of completion. Authorities promise that another 1,000 kilometers will be finished soon.
It's such a pity, then, that so many of the others are far less popular than predicted. Even in large towns with millions of residents, like Lucknow and Jaipur, they look more like political prestige projects than genuine attempts to transform urban transit. And in India’s megacities, metros are underperforming badly. Mumbai’s ridership is about 30% of what its planners promised, and Bengaluru’s is just 6%.
What went wrong? Everyone has different answers. The parliamentary committee that oversees urban development argues that the problem is last-mile connectivity: If you leave a metro station, you can’t connect to buses or
