Dhaka metro rail company is expected to bring in the first two sets of metro trains from Japan in a month or two, out of the five sets now ready for shipment.
Although five out of 24 train sets for mass rapid transit (MRT) line-06 remain ready, the making of other sets will take much time.
Sources said the Japanese maker had been left overburdened with the train sets ready now because of a halt to scheduled shipment in April as coronavirus hit global activities.
"It took time to prepare robots to manufacture first two sets. Once they learn the system, the rest wouldn't take much time," said a source preferring anonymity.
Dhaka Mass Transit Company Limited (DMTCL) is building four metro rails for the megacity. Of them, MRT-06 is in the implementation stage, making 53.58-per cent progress so far.
The Kawasaki-Mitsubishi consortium has been tasked with making 24 sets of trains having six bogies each by 2022 as per a contract signed on August 06, 2017.
DMTCL managing director MAN Siddique at a monthly press briefing on the progress of MRT lines on Thursday said MRT-06 train sets would be brought home under a special arrangement.
As embassy offices in both countries are yet to open for visa processing, special permission has been sought to allow a DMTCL technical team to visit Japan.
Shipment cannot start without the team's inspection and testing of the trains.
"We expect to send a technical team in the second week of January under a special arrangement. Once they okay the train sets, shipment will start," Mr Siddique told journalists.
Integrated test and trial run will be carried out in Bangladesh after arrival of the trains. Then the next three sets of trains will be brought here.
After exhausting all the procedures, Mr Siddique said, the Japanese company will start manufacturing the remaining trains.
Sources said the trains would be taken to the depot by a river route as axle load and turning capacity of roads do not permit transporting any metro train.
As the consortium is responsible for shipping the train sets to the depot, they have finalised the route including the Mongla seaport.
A temporary jetty has been built at Ashulia to unload the trains.
Mr Siddique said the ongoing pandemic delayed MRT-06 work, yet they hope to open the Uttara-Agargaon route by December 16, 2021, on the occasion of the golden jubilee of the country's independence.
Trial run of the first-phase train sets will be done at Uttara North, Uttara South and Uttara Centre stations.
He said viaduct erection work on the first 10 kilometres up to Agargaon was completed. Five stations' development work is also going on smoothly.
A progress report shows depot infrastructure work has been completed 75.5 per cent, Agargaon-Farmgate work 52 per cent and Karwanbazar-Motijheel work 53 per cent.
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