On New Year’s Eve, no need to swipe Nol card to enter four Dubai Metro stations

Passengers using the Dubai Metro on New Year’s Eve will not need to swipe their Nol cards to enter four of the busiest stations.

At Burj Khalifa/Dubai Mall, Financial Centre, Emirates Towers and Business Bay, the gates to metro platforms will stay open and passengers will be able to enter without swiping their cards.

“This is a crowd management procedure,” explains Muhammad Yousuf Al Mudharreb, Director of Unified Automated Fare Collection at the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA).

“The main idea behind this concept is that when passengers leave the event, they will find the gates open. We are hoping this will reduce congestion at these stations.”

However, passengers will need to swipe the Nol card for checking out at their destination stations. “When the passenger checks out he will be charged. The system will automatically recognise that the passenger checked in at one of these four stations and the charge will be deducted while checking out,” explains Al Mudharreb.

“The four stations are in the same zone, so the charge will be the same from these stations,” he adds.

The new method of charging for use of the metro is based on the experience of the past two years on New Years’ Eve, when crowds were seen lining up for the metro outside these four stations.

“This year, a million visitors are expected to visit the area around Burj Khalifa, and the metro and bus are the preferred means of transport,” says Al Mudharreb.

“Last year there were 800,000 visitors in the area,” he adds. “We expect an increase of 15-20 per cent in the number of visitors.

“I cannot say the metro stations will not be crowded this time but we hope to manage the crowd better. Let us see if the new method works,” says Al Mudharreb.

If it works, RTA plans to implement it during other events in future.
 

Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.