IT was nothing but good news for Shanghai commuters yesterday when the boss of the city's Metro operator announced that the maximum waiting time for trains during rush hour periods will be reduced to three minutes ... in 2018 ... on selected lines.

Yu Guangyao, president of Shanghai Shentong Metro Group, said that the reduced intervals will be introduced in about two years' time, in a bid to relieve the pressing and very current problem of commuter log jams.

"We will buy more trains, run them more frequently to shorten the intervals," Yu, who is also a local lawmaker, told Shanghai Daily on the sidelines of the ongoing annual session of the Shanghai People's Congress.