KARACHI: With their gleaming steel bodies, hand-painted motifs, colored bulbs and thumping Japanese woofers, Karachi’s W-11 minibuses were once the most flamboyant vehicles on the road: moving art galleries that defined the city’s visual identity and became a symbol of its chaotic charm.

For decades, the wildly decorated buses ferried thousands across Pakistan’s largest metropolis, earning global attention through documentaries, exhibitions and even a temporary London art route themed around W-11 culture.

But today, the same icons of Karachi’s working-class life are rapidly disappearing, pushed aside by rickshaw fleets, app-based transport and the provincial government’s shift toward modern bus rapid transit systems.

Of the more than 400 W-11 buses that once dominated the route from North Karachi to Keamari, barely 120 still operate, and only a dozen retain their traditional ornate style.

“These were the bride buses of their time,” said Muhammad Saleem, 69, who drove W-11 for nearly five decades and watched its fare rise “from 50 paisas to Rs90,” which even now is less than a dollar. 

“We used to have Pioneer tape decks, three-piece sets. The big ones. They had Japanese speakers inside, Japanese woofers, and the vehicle had real sound,” he recalled.

The decline of W-11 is rooted in Pakistan’s broader transportation crisis.

Karachi, a city of more than 20 million, lacks an integrated public transport network and has long depended on privately operated buses and minibuses that receive no state subsidy. Rising fuel prices, expensive spare parts and aging fleets have made the system increasingly unviable for owners.

Meanwhile, the explosion of motorbike rickshaws has eaten away at ridership. In the last few years, the Sindh government has also rolled out diesel-hybrid bus rapid transit (BRT) lines and the Sindh Intra-District People’s Bus Service, while piloting electric buses, modern alternatives that have further reduced space for traditional minibuses.

A decade ago, Karachi had around 12,000 buses running on nearly 600 routes. Today, only about 5,000 remain, according to the Sindh Mass Transit Authority. JICA and World Bank studies estimate the city needs at least 10,000–15,000 buses to function properly.

Within this shrinking ecosystem, W-11’s survival has become nearly impossible.

‘PASSION HAS NO PRICE’

Last week, that struggle caught the attention of Shehzad Mughal, a 46-year-old Pakistani expatriate from the UAE who acquired one of the last fully decorated W-11s.

“Sitting in this bus today takes me back 25 years,” he said. “I had this passion since childhood, and today, by the grace of God, I’ve the opportunity to fulfill it.”

But even for enthusiasts, the cost is overwhelming.

“The body alone of this bus standing here has cost over Rs3 million ($10680),” Mughal said. “As for returns, there really aren’t any… But passion has no price, and passion has no return.”

Veteran driver Abdul Hameed, who has run W-11 for 35 years, said rising maintenance costs were driving owners out.

“The spare parts for these vehicles have become so expensive that not every owner can afford them,” he said, recalling how “each W-11 would be better than the other and the public would wait for our buses.”

CRAFTSMEN LOSING LIVELIHOODS

For decades, W-11’s distinct identity relied on Karachi’s unique craftsmen: painters, metalworkers and body fabricators whose work turned ordinary chassis into rolling works of art.

Muhammad Shafiq, a body maker for 20 years, described the intricate construction process:

“Only the frame comes, the chassis, just two rods come from Japan, and on that we build the [whole] body frame.”

But with orders dwindling, the craft is dying.

“Each body maker would have ten buses lined up and they wouldn’t even have time to scratch their heads,” said Muhammad Arif, who spent 15 years learning the trade and recently took six months to complete Mughal’s steel-bodied bus.

“Now this work has almost disappeared… maybe in months or even a year or more, you might get one or half a bus to work on.”

But despite W-11’s fame, officials say it does not legally meet “heritage” criteria that would enable its protection.

“W-11 does have a cultural feel and foreigners often promote it,” said Bashir Hussain, deputy director of bus operations at the Sindh Mass Transit Authority. 

He suggested the artwork could survive “as a design or skin” on new buses, even if the traditional vehicles fade away.

For former drivers like Saleem, however, no modern bus can replace what W-11 meant to Karachi.

“Passengers would say, ‘Let my journey be longer, so I may not get off this ride’,” he recalled, smiling at the memory of a city once in love with its most colorful commute.