ProUI

Suburban train services

The State Cabinet gave its green signal for a feasibility study on suburban train services between Thiruvananthapuram and Chengannur as well as Thiruvananthapuram and Harippad on Wednesday.

Chief Minister Oommen Chandy told the media after the Cabinet meeting that the project was proposed to be taken up as a joint venture between the Indian Railways and the State Government.

A special purpose vehicle (company) would be formed with participation of the government and the Railways for implementation.

The feasibility study would be entrusted to the Mumbai Railway Vikas Corporation, a joint venture of the Railways and the Maharashtra government operating suburban services in Mumbai.

The Chief Minister said that platforms and other facilities would have to be upgraded and automatic signalling system introduced to facilitate running of Mainline Electrical Multiple Units (MEMU) continuously during peak hours.

The MEMUs would stop at 25 stations along the route.

Mr. Chandy said that double lines of the existing railway network would be sufficient for the services. Services would be scheduled in such a way as not to affect the passenger and express train services along the routes. However, the timing of goods trains would have to be altered.

He said that as per rough calculations, the cost of the project would be about Rs.20 crore a km.

This was lower than that for other projects such as the proposed north-south high speed railway corridor. The Cabinet had taken the decision based on preliminary report submitted by Biju Prabhakar who had visited Mumbai to study the suburban system there and hold discussions with Mumbai Railway Vikas Corporation.

The Chief Minister said that he had met Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge along with K. Sudhakaran and M.I. Shanavas, MPS, in Delhi and submitted a memorandum listing the State’s demands for railway development, including formation of a railway zone in the State.

The Railways were complaining of delays in land acquisition in the State and difficulties in getting earth for filling and quarrying.

Road repair

Mr. Chandy said the roads damaged in heavy rain across the State would be repaired in a month. The Cabinet had given administrative sanction for works totalling Rs.431 crore. It had also decided to release Rs.200 crore additionally. Minister for Public Works V.K. Ebrahim Kunju was visiting the districts to review restoration works. He had already visited seven districts and would be visiting the rest of the district by the end of this month.


Project proposed as a joint venture between Railways and State

Special purpose vehicle envisaged

Southern Railway Mazdoor Union, Tiruchi, has urged the Southern Railway General Manager to take steps to fill up vacancies and create additional posts at Tiruchi division in view of the increased work load.The union office bearers handed over a memorandum containing a set of demands to the Southern Railway General Manager Rakesh Misra during his visit to the city on Tuesday.The memorandum said train services had increased all over Tiruchi Division with double line to be completed in the chord line section from Villupuram to Tiruchi. Considering the present and future workloads, additional trackmen should be posted in the division. There were more than 100 vacancies in the Station Master category in the division. The station masters are forced to work in roster and their request for voluntary retirement was not being accepted.The union requested the General Manager to sanction over time allowance to all station masters in Tiruchi division as was being sanctioned in other divisions. The memorandum further said many vacancies prevailed in Group ‘D’ operating staff. Implementation of eight hours roster for Traffic staff working in stations and gatekeepers of Traffic / Engineering department in the chord line section and creation of additional posts of ticket checking staff were among their other demands.

A small portion of railway lines were damaged when a landmine planted by Maoists went off at Harichandanpur area of Odisha's Keonjhar district police sources said today. None was hurt in the incident on Jakhpura-Bansapani railway line between Sagadpata and Tangiriapal yesterday, the sources said. Since only a small portion of the track was damaged, train services on the route remained unaffected. A detonator and some wire were recovered from the spot.

With an aim to provide better passenger amenities and comfort to the commuters, Railways have decided to augment additional coaches in Puri-Lokmanya Tilak Terminus (LTT)-Puri Express, Puri-Sai Nagar Shirdi-Puri Express and Koraput-Visakhapatnam-Koraput Express o­n permanent basis.

One AC-3 tier coach each will be augmented permanently in 22866/22865 Puri-LTT-Puri Express w.e.f. 27th August from Puri & w.e.f. 29thAugust 2013 from LTT and in 18407/18408 Puri-Sai Nagar Shirdi-Puri Express w.e.f. 30th August 2013 from Puri and w.e.f. 1st September 2013 from Sai Nagar Shirdi.

Similarly, 18512/18511 Visakhapatnam-Koraput-Visakhapatnam bi-weekly express will be augmented with 02 Second Class Chair Car coach w.e.f. 23rd August 2013 from Visakhapatnam and w.e.f. 24th August 2013 from Koraput.

Karnal:
The Rs 2,200-crore rail coach factory (RCF) to be set up at Sonepat would start with 400 coaches annually and roll out 1,000 coaches when fully commissioned, Minister of state for Railways Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury said today.Chowdhary, who was here to lay the foundation stone of a railway under-bridge at Gharaunda, said the rail coach factory would come up on 500 acres and the Haryana Government had expressed its willingness to provide 370 acres “free of cost” for the project.The under-bridge would be a boon for the population of 60 villages which was facing closure of the highway at the railway crossing every 10 minutes with over 100 trains running on this track.The minister said plans were being worked out to extend the Delhi Metro to the National Capital Region (NCR) and Meerut. Terming the Bihar rail tragedy as unfortunate, he said that an inquiry committee has been constituted to probe the incident.Chowdhury said such underbridges would be constructed at other busy places in the state to reduce the number of accidents on railway crossings.

South Central Railway will temporarily augment the following express trains with five additional Sleeper Class Coaches during October, 2013 to clear the extra rush / waitlisted passengers as per the details mentioned below:-           

    1.Tr.No. 12730 H S Nanded - Pune Bi-Weekly Express departing o­n Tuesdays and Sundays                    i.e., o­n 1st, 6th, 8th, 13th, 15th, 20th, 22nd, 27th and 29th October, 2013.

  2.Tr.No. 12729 Pune - H S Nanded Bi- Weekly Express departing o­n Mondays and Wednesdays      i.e., o­n 2nd, 7th, 9th, 14th, 16th, 21st, 23rd, 28th and 30th October, 2013.
  3.Tr.No. 17614 H S Nanded - Pune Weekly Express departing Fridays i.e., o­n 4th, 11th, 18th and    25th October, 2013.
    4.Tr.No. 17613 Pune - H S Nanded Weekly Express departing Saturdays i.e., o­n 5th, 12th, 19th      and 26th October, 2013.
          These 130 additional Sleeper Class Coach services will make available 9360 additional Sleeper Class berths.

The Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corporation (DMICDC) plans to build an Intra-city rail network in the Dholera Special Investment Region in Gujarat.

The project is estimated to cost $500 million.

The Dholera region, spread over 900 square kilometres, is being developed as a new greenfield industrial hub in Gujarat. It is about 100 km south of Ahmedabad and a designated investment zone under the ambitious Delhi Mumbai Industrial corridor project.

DMICDC is the lead developer of Dholera. The Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development project is being partly funded by the Japanese Government.

A senior official of DMICDC told Business Line that since Dholera is being developed as a city of the future with an integrated infrastructure, this will help attract investments and enhance productivity. Therefore, the corporation is considering the setting up either a mono or Metro rail system for commuters to travel within the city.

The corporation will shortly appoint a consultant to study the technical and financial feasibility of the transport project.

The DMIDC has already acquired about 100 sq. km. of land under the first phase. Construction for the city will start by December. The land has been acquired using the pooling method, which ensures that the original owner gets back compensatory land close to the project site.

Suburban train services

The State Cabinet gave its green signal for a feasibility study on suburban train services between Thiruvananthapuram and Chengannur as well as Thiruvananthapuram and Harippad on Wednesday.

Chief Minister Oommen Chandy told the media after the Cabinet meeting that the project was proposed to be taken up as a joint venture between the Indian Railways and the State Government.

A special purpose vehicle (company) would be formed with participation of the government and the Railways for implementation.

The feasibility study would be entrusted to the Mumbai Railway Vikas Corporation, a joint venture of the Railways and the Maharashtra government operating suburban services in Mumbai.

The Chief Minister said that platforms and other facilities would have to be upgraded and automatic signalling system introduced to facilitate running of Mainline Electrical Multiple Units (MEMU) continuously during peak hours.

The MEMUs would stop at 25 stations along the route.

Mr. Chandy said that double lines of the existing railway network would be sufficient for the services. Services would be scheduled in such a way as not to affect the passenger and express train services along the routes. However, the timing of goods trains would have to be altered.

He said that as per rough calculations, the cost of the project would be about Rs.20 crore a km.

This was lower than that for other projects such as the proposed north-south high speed railway corridor. The Cabinet had taken the decision based on preliminary report submitted by Biju Prabhakar who had visited Mumbai to study the suburban system there and hold discussions with Mumbai Railway Vikas Corporation.

The Chief Minister said that he had met Railway Minister Mallikarjun Kharge along with K. Sudhakaran and M.I. Shanavas, MPS, in Delhi and submitted a memorandum listing the State’s demands for railway development, including formation of a railway zone in the State.

The Railways were complaining of delays in land acquisition in the State and difficulties in getting earth for filling and quarrying.

Road repair

Mr. Chandy said the roads damaged in heavy rain across the State would be repaired in a month. The Cabinet had given administrative sanction for works totalling Rs.431 crore. It had also decided to release Rs.200 crore additionally. Minister for Public Works V.K. Ebrahim Kunju was visiting the districts to review restoration works. He had already visited seven districts and would be visiting the rest of the district by the end of this month.


Project proposed as a joint venture between Railways and State

Special purpose vehicle envisaged

With the railway network being under-developed in coastal Karnataka, there is a need for a West Coast Zone or, at the least, a Mangalore Division of the Indian Railways, a meeting of railway enthusiasts and the Kanara Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KCCI) decided here on Wednesday.The meeting was held by KCCI and Railway Yatri Sangha, Udupi and involved activists and commuters, to identify problems and chalk out solutions for better rail connectivity. The eight-point resolution would be carried forward by the KCCI and members who represent the region in the Railway Users Consultative Committees at the Divisional level (DRUCC) of Palakkad divisions and Konkan Railways (scheduled for September 20 in Mumbai).Chairperson of the KCCI Sub-committee on Railways G.G. Mohandas Prabhu said that as 75 per cent of Palakkad division’s revenue came from goods movement from the New Mangalore Port, the division hesitated to form a new division for Mangalore.He proposed that the Mangalore, Palakkad and Trivandrum divisions should be clubbed under the West Coast Zone of the Railways, and be based here.Another resolution that received much support was the improvement of the connectivity of the port city with the state capital.

Rail line

Presenting his survey of the Nandikur to Moodigere railway line, via Karkala and Ujire (Charmadi Ghats), president of the Sangha R.L. Dias, said the line will provide an alternative to the problem-ridden Mangalore-Bangalore line via Sakleshpur.

“Most of the land in Charmadi is under private ownership, though the British had already built a road through some sections of the Ghats. Only around four tunnels are needed on this line to assuage environmental concerns…With trains now taking 2.5 hours to traverse 55 kms of Sakleshpur ghats, this alternative line would boost rail connectivity to the capital,” he said.

He also demanded an additional express train on the Sakeshpur line.

Among the other resolutions of the meeting was to introduce a Vasco-Da-Gama passenger train to Mangalore, additional stops on the Mangalore-Madgaon train, making the tri-weekly Yesvanthpur-Karwar train a daily train, and the extension of the Bhatkal-Thokur DEMU (Diesel-electric Multiple Unit) train to Karwar.

75 p.c. of Palakkad Division revenue comes from goods movement from Mangalore Port

Nandikur-Moodigere line proposed as an alternative Bangalore-Mangalore train rout

Four runaway school boys were rescued by the Government Railway Police at Salem Railway Junction and were handed over to their parents on Wednesday evening.The police said that at around 6.30 p.m. they noticed four students on platform number one without their parents or relatives. Inquiry revealed that one was studying Class VII, two studying Class IX and one studying Class X in different schools in the city and they were from Fairlands. They had decided to catch a train and reach Chennai without the knowledge of their parents.