For this, an in-principle approval is needed from Chief Minister Mayawati, which the officials concerned are hopeful of receiving by the end of this month.

A two-member team of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC), comprising Director (Works) Mangu Singh and Deputy Chief Project Manager P K Garg, made a presentation in this regard before the development authorities of seven most congested cities of the state on Tuesday.

“These cities — Lucknow, Kanpur, Ghaziabad, Agra, Allahabad, Meerut and Varanasi — are faced with increasing pressure of traffic. The government thus plans to improve the transport conditions of these cities,” said Principal Secretary Urban Development Shankar Agarwal.

The development authorities of these seven cities made presentations before the DMRC — giving a detailed picture of the traffic, growth and requirement in the next 20 years. “This included existing and proposed construction of railway overbridges, flyovers, underground/multi-level parkings, overhead/underground mono rail, Metro Rail, proposed corridors, traffic growth rate, etc,” said N R Verma, Chief Town and Country Planner (CTCP), Lucknow, who is also the nodal officer for the Metro rail project.

These presentations come in response to the state government’s recent correspondence to DMRC in this regard. In reply, DMRC had asked the development authorities concerned to prepare their “Urban Transportation/Rejuvenation Plan” based on their city master plans.

Referring DMRC visit as a preliminary exercise for introducing better transportation in the state, Verma said: “Now, the state government will get a traffic study conducted by an agency like Rites before DMRC conducts the feasibility report of the same.”