The project involves preparing designs for an 11-kilometre extension that is expected to have five stations running from Al-Jadaf to International City. It will cross the creek on the planned sixth crossing and interconnect with the planned blue line that will run along Emirates road. It will also connect with bus and marine transport terminals.

The Dubai Rapid Link (DURL) consortium was awarded the AED4.1bn ($1.1bn) contract for the first phase of the green line in 2006. The contract was placed as an option to the AED12.5bn contract awarded to DURL in June 2005 for the red line.

The works for the green line are now under way and involve the construction of the 20-kilometre line running in a loop from Dubai International Airport through Deira and Bur Dubai to Rashidiya.

The DURL consortium is led by Japan's Mitsubishi Corporation and includes Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Obayashi Corporation and Kajima Corporation, all of Japan; and Turkey’s Yapi Merkezi. France’s Systra and the US-based Parsons International is the engineer.

Tenders are also expected for two other construction contracts on the metro project. The first is for the blue line, which will link Dubai International Airport and Jebel Ali International Airport. The second is for the red line extension that will extend the line by 12 kilometres from the Jebel Ali Free Zone area to the Abu Dhabi border (MEED 5:3:08).