Title - Drive-in facility set up

A drive-in facility was provided at Vijayawada railway station west booking side for the first time in south India. Nearly five cars can be parked at the drive-in space developed on Platform No. 10. Inspe-cting the development works on Tuesday, railway divisional manager Anurag said that Platform No. 10 would be developed on par with Platform No. 1. He said the facility was provided here after Delhi, Howrah and Bhopal railway stations, for the convenience of passengers.The DRM said that at present trains proceeding towards Hyderabad are being taken on Platform No. 10 and after updating interlocking system, trains from both sides will be taken on the platform. He said a passenger lift would be set up on Platform No. 10. Mr Anurag said the Platform No.s 8 and 9 also would be improved and additional foot over bridge would be constructed connecting Platform No.s 7 to 10. He said Camtech system was introduced at a cost of Rs.30 lakh to provide water to coaches with high pressure water release. With the new system, watering of trains will be completed in five minutes.Besides, remodelling of Vijayawada yard Phase I was completed and the second and final stage works would be completed by November, he said.Meanwhile, the DRM said that a road under bridge (RUB) would be constructed near Vambay Colony to prevent trespassing of people into railway yard. The RUB would help in providing road connectivity to residents of Vambay Colony to the city. The DRM said the circulating area in front of east booking was improved and drainage system was provided to prevent water logging of the area.

Mr Anurag said that th-ere was huge potential for increase in freight traffic from Krishnapatnam and Kakinada ports. Keeping in view the proposed Mac-hilipatnam port, they dev-eloped the existing platf-orm at Machilipatnam rai-lway station and are planning to take up further de-velopment works at the station, he said. A maintenance line was also commissioned at Machilipatnam, he said.

Mr Anurag also informed that the Kazipet-Vijayaw-ada third line was appro-ved in Railway Budget 2012-13 and survey has been taken up for this new line. Initially, the work on this line would be taken up between Vijayawada and Kondapalli. It would redu-ce the waiting of trains at outer signals and improve the movement of trains.