The mayor of Jerusalem is seeking to cancel plans for expanding the city's light rail system in favor of buses, which he is calling a less expensive and more flexible alternative.
"Barkat said the modern buses would be "a fifth of the price and much easier to deploy" than the light rail that has snarled Jerusalem's roads for five years and is three years behind schedule."
"Barkat also said he is pressuring the contractors to have the first two lines up and running by the end of 2010."
"'I'm now focusing on the next two, three lines. I believe they are going to be different, fundamentally very different in the deployment - both route and technology. Today there are much better technologies than trains - for example, BRTs, Bus Rapid Transport, which are long buses a fifth of the price and much easier to deploy.'"
"'I cannot sign on it yet, but most likely those routes will be BRTs and not trains. [They are] much faster to deploy and they provide practically very similar, if not the same [results]. We are now working on those plans and I believe that with new, fresh thinking we could probably converge on a network that will serve the city faster, easier and cheaper,' he said. "
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