10 years of Mumbai monorail: The joyride that never took off

At a quiet train station in Chembur, the ticket seller wordlessly raises three fingers to every curious face. The next train is at 3 pm. The time? 2:20 pm. On a working Monday, chartered accountant T Subramaniam isn’t thrilled. “What is happening?” he mutters. The 20-minute ride to Wadala will now take over an hour. “As it is, the frequency is bad. Every 15 to 20 minutes.The indicators don't work and at some stations, they are completely blank. Connectivity is also bad,” laments the 11th Road resident. “Why are you all even running the service?” Subramaniam shrugs at the stranger who often finds himself dispensing apologetic smiles in place of QR-coded tickets. “Might as well shut it down.”
Over a decade since it began, Mumbai’s monorail has never managed to shake off its reputation as an underwhelming experiment. Marred by delays, technical glitches, and underutilization, it’s often regarded as a ‘joyride’ rather than a serious mode of transport. As Chembur-based comedian Rahul Subramaniam quipped in a viral routine, “Michael Jackson’s moonwalk covers more distance.”
Launched in 2014, the monorail project aimed to connect Chembur to Wadala and, eventually, Jacob Circle, stretching 20 kilometres through eastern Mumbai. The first phase, covering a modest 8 kilometres from Chembur to Wadala, began operations in February 2014, but only after six years of delays. It wasn’t until 2019 that the full route to Jacob Circle was completed.
The monorail was expected to ease congestion and provide a reliable alternative to road and rail transport, but the reality has been far from ideal. With only a handful of rakes, infrequent service, and poorly connected stations, it has struggled to attract a steady flow of commuters.

The monorail’s troubles became glaringly obvious when a fire broke out on an empty train in November 2019. Fortunately, no one was injured, but the incident exposed serious gaps in fire safety measures and reinforced the perception of the monorail as a failure. “Are the rumours true? Is the service shutting down?” asks Chembur resident Sushma Bajpai. Like many others, Bajpai is frustrated by the monorail’s limited reach, which stops short of South Bombay. “It stops at Sant Gadge Mahara Chowk near Saat Rasta. To get to Worli, we have to find other transport.”
Many commuters still avoid the monorail altogether, citing its unreliability and limited connectivity. “I was a fan of the monorail,” says railway activist AV Shenoy. “Being a project undertaken by L & T along with Malaysia's Scomi, I was under the impression that it would be done in a very efficient manner. But that did not happen. It took years just to get the first phase running, and when it finally did, the frequency was poor, and the stations weren’t well-connected.”
Shenoy points out that the monorail stops at obscure stations that don’t draw enough passengers. “The route was poorly planned,” he says. “It ends abruptly near Kasturba Hospital, far from Mahalaxmi station. They didn’t even think about connecting it to key transit hubs.”

During our visit to the Chembur station, few passengers seemed concerned about the delays, mostly resigned to them.
Over the span of forty minutes, only one college student was spotted holding a pass. Inside the train, a toddler pressed his nose against the window as the monorail rumbled past contrasting scenes—multi-story parking towers on one side and slums covered with tarpaulins on the other.
Some passengers, like Green Acres school student Dhyaana Gupta, appreciate the monorail for its affordability. “It’s cheaper than a taxi,” she says. Others, like Subramaniam, are tempted to abandon it for more dependable options, like BEST buses. “What’s the point of having more rakes if the service is not useful?” he asks.

The monorail’s woes are not just operational—they are financial too. After years of losses, the project’s cumulative deficit is projected to touch Rs 520 crore in 2023-24. The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) has been struggling to keep the service afloat, even after taking over operations from the L&T-Scomi consortium in 2018.
At the inauguration of Phase II in March 2019, the then chief minister Devendra Fadnavis had estimated that 1 lakh people will travel by Monorail network per day. However, the ridership per day is 18,000.
On September 17, 2024, only two rakes were operational instead of the required six to seven, leading to train frequencies as low as one per hour. A station official said, “We have 7 rakes on our fleet of which one is on standby and one in maintenance. But since the start of monsoon, we are witnessing frequent breakdown because of which frequency is poor.”
A senior official stated that 10 new rakes had been ordered, with one already undergoing safety inspection. However, even if the new rakes arrive, Shenoy remains skeptical. “I doubt they will break even. There’s just not enough demand.”
The monorail's failure to attract ridership has been largely attributed to the poor frequency of trains, currently at 15-minute intervals. At present, only 142 services operate on weekdays, with 64 services on Sundays and holidays.
By adding ten new monorail trains, the frequency of service could potentially increase to over 250 trips, depending on the Train Operation Plan (TOP) at the time.
Shenoy also believes that the monorail's biggest problem is a lack of ownership. “There’s no authority in charge. It was supposed to be handed over to the Metro, but it hasn’t happened. Right now, it’s like an orphan,” he says, suggesting that the government consider privatizing the service or forming a committee to assess its future. “They need to decide whether to improve it or shut it down altogether.”
As Subramaniam disembarks at Wadala, a familiar announcement echoes through the nearly empty station: "The next train has been cancelled."