Bhubaneswar: More city buses are set to run on the capital's streets.

The Bhubaneswar-Puri Transport Services Limited (BPTSL) has chalked out a detailed plan to roll out the ambitious Bhubaneswar City Bus Modernisation Plan here, a day after the project got the final approval of the empowered committee on infrastructure of the state government on Monday.

Bhubaneswar Development Authority vice-chairman Krishan Kumar said the committee had given a go-ahead to increase the number of buses along with adequate infrastructure.

"We will include a fleet of 200 new city buses that will increase the frequency of buses here. We aim to have a bus ready for people every four minutes," said Kumar.

The authorities have decided to execute the project in four phases. In the first phase, 50 standard air-conditioned buses, 50 standard non air-conditioned buses and 100 midi buses will be added to the existing fleet of 110 buses. Two new bus depots for parking the new buses will also be developed by November.

In the second phase, electric buses will be introduced as part of the e-mobility plan of the city. This phase will be completed by the end of 2019. In the third phase, city outskirts will be brought under the city bus network by 2020. In the final phase, 400 new buses will be added for the estimated population of about 2.5 million by 2025.

"We have set milestones according to the needs of the people that has been decided looking at the growth of the city and its population. We will have 310 city buses by November 2018, 600 buses by the end of 2020 and by the time the project reaches its final stage, we will have a total of 1,000 city buses," said an official of the BPTSL.

Sources said that priority will be given to the first phase mainly for Men's Hockey World Cup scheduled to be held in November. The authorities will integrate IT-based tool such as vehicle tracking and passenger information system, route planner, operation scheduling, crew scheduling under the ongoing Smart City Mission.