Ninety four years later after EMUs or local trains first started, the government is finally talking about another mass public transport that shall overshadow the suburban rail in the near future. On September 7, at the inauguration of three more Metro rail lines, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis stated how within next five years more than 1 crore people shall be travelling in various Metro rail lines running in Mumbai and its Metropolitan Region. Mumbai will have a Metro rail network of 337 kms, the largest across India in the coming years. "The suburban rail carries 80-lakh people today. We expect over one crore people to use the Metro rail lines by 2024. We are also working on hybrid metro rail which will be a game changer when it will cover narrowest of roads especially in areas like Kalyan, Dombivali and Bhiwandi," said Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis at the inauguration function. The new-age metro rail network will gradually overshadow the suburban rail lines as far as its route kilometers is concerned. The intentions can be seen as the Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation (MRVC) has cut short the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) - Panvel fast elevated corridor; to Wadala-Panvel corridor. It has been replaced by the CSMT-Wadala Metro line 11 which was part of the total three metro lines that was inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday. Initially metro rail was proposed to connect east-west corridors while the suburban rail connects north-south. However now works on different metro rail is on which also runs north-south. Some of the ongoing routes like Andheri (E)-Dahisar (E) Metro 7, Dahisar - DN Nagar Metro 2A etc also runs parallel to suburban rail network. The railway officials have been stating that the initiative to expand suburban railway network should come forth from the Maharashtra government. "The Maharashtra government is clear about expanding its Metro rail lines throughout the MMR. We will be basically connecting far suburbs where there is scope for suburban network. For so many years, the suburban network was carrying the burden but now there shall be another mass transport system that shall go hand in hand," said senior railway official.

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