Happy 8th birthday to our favourite mass transit system…

Yesterday marked the 8th anniversary of the opening of the Dubai Metro. A now-iconic public service that we’re pretty sure most Dubai residents can’t imagine life without these days.

This isn’t the only hallmark, however, that the citywide mass transit system passed as the RTA has announced that as of the end of August, over 1 billion (yes, billion with a ‘b’) passengers have now travelled on it since launching back on 9 September 2009.

The official numbers break down as 689 million rides on the red line, and 339 million rides on the green line which opened in September 2011.

Mattar Al Tayer, Director-General and Chairman of the Board of Executive Directors of the RTA, said in an official statement that hitting the 1 billion mark is a significant milestone: “The number of metro riders has soared by 54% from 38.887 m riders in 2010 to 60 m riders in 2011. The number shot to 104 m riders in 2014, and grew further to 121 m riders in 121 m riders in 2016.”

Covering a combined distance of 75 km, the Dubai Metro is the longest driverless metro system in the world and boasts a number of other accolades including the Union Station being the world’s largest underground metro station spanning an area of 25 thousand square metres.

On which stations had contributed the largest number of rides, Al Tayer said: “The Union Station accounted for the largest number of Red Line users recording 47.798m riders, followed by Deira City Center Station (46.878m riders), just ahead of Burjuman Station (46.749 riders), then came Al Rigga Station which served about 44 m riders,”

That’s a whole lot of people. Of course, anyone who has travelled on the red line after work towards Rashidiya shouldn’t be too surprised by those numbers.

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Images: supplied