Dozens of local and foreign expertsattended a seminar held to discuss setting up of a rapid transit systemusing buses in HCM City.

Speaking at the eventorganised earlier this week by the city Department of Transport, theWorld Bank, and Agence Francaise de Dévelopment, delegates said tolimit the use of private vehicles a Bus Rapid Transit system that canoperate at higher speeds than ordinary buses and reduce air pollutionis imperative.

It will also provide commuters rail-transit quality at the cost of bustransit, they said, adding the system can be set up by makingimprovements to existing infrastructure, vehicles, and scheduling.

The cost of developing a BRT is 5 million USD per kilometre and thesystem takes a maximum of five years to build compared to 40 millionUSD and 10 years for an underground system.

The city’s first metro project on the Ben Thanh- Suoi Tien route isprojected to cost 1.1 billion USD and be finished in 2015.

It will carry 526,000 passengers a day.

The city plans to operate three underground and six skytrain routes to meet the burgeoning demand for public transport.

Le Van Dien, a senior official at the city’s Urban Railway Management,said a tramway system should be limit in the city rather than a BRT.

But Georg Puettner of the World Bank rejected the idea, saying the cityshould develop the metro and bus systems, not a tramway.

Also attending the seminar were officials from the HCM City Researchand Planning Centre, an agency set up by the city together with itssister, Rhone Apples in France .

According to the Department of Transport, the city will have 4.5million motorbikes on its roads by 2011, considerably worseningcongestion.

Last year the city’s 3000 buses carried 3.2 million passengers, or just 7 percent of total commuters./.