Dubai Metro to launch massive marketing and promotion campaign

The metro will also unveil a special logo of its own, that was recently approved by Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai, UAE Minister of Finance and Industry and Chairman of Dubai Municipality.

This came in a meeting of the Higher Committee of Dubai Metro which is headed by Qassim Sultan, Director General of Dubai Municipality.

The committee members were briefed by Nasser Ahmed Saeed, Assistant Director General of Dubai Municipality for Metro and Public Transport and General Coordinator for Dubai Metro, about the project's progress of works over the past two months.

It was decided in the meeting that a special ceremony would soon be held to unveil the Dubai Metro logo.

Saeed noted that a mechanism was agreed with DURL (Dubai Urban Rapid Link), the consortium undertaking the project, to dig tunnels in various parts of the city as well as with suppliers of the electronic control systems for the metro.

The committee also discussed the need to appoint a separate firm for running and maintaining the Metro after the project's completion. The provisions for this would be included in the project's final design before its construction. In this regard, the committee stressed the need to train UAE nationals for occupying the leading and supervisory jobs at Dubai Metro.

Sultan noted in this regard that Dubai Metro's plans are going ahead in line with the directives of His Highness Sheikh Maktoum Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice Present and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai, UAE Minister of Finance and Industry, and Chairman of Dubai Municipality and General Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Minister of Defence, all of whom have emphasized the need to provide job opportunities for the national cadres in managing and operating major projects of the country.

"The Dubai Metro Higher Committee, based on these directives, will encourage the major companies that are involved in the project's implementation to appoint UAE nationals in most of the jobs so that, in the end, it is who they have to run the metro when it starts operating in 2007," said Sultan.

The committee also discussed proposals regarding the construction of a permanent headquarters for the metro and a control center. In total, there will be two offices for the metro. It is expected that the foundation stone of Dubai Metro would soon be laid in a key area of Dubai.

The committee plans to run Dubai Metro as a major investment project in order to provide the public with the most appropriate mass transit and public transport facilities.

Members of the committee who attended the meeting included Mattar Al Tayer, Deputy Director General of Dubai Municipality, Hussein Nasser Lootah, Saeed Al Sharid, Major General (Retd) Sharafuddin Al Sayyid Hussein, and Abdullah Al Hashmi.