Bandra Garib-Rath - नाम से गरीब, लेकिन मेरे दिल के करीब - Abdul Rehman

The Railways is probing the feasibility of laying a third rail (to source power) parallel to the track that leads to Harbour Terminus Station from the city, since the Navy had raised concerns of overhead powerlines posing a threat to the safety of aircraft that took off from
the Naval airport.
Kerala Rail Development Corporation Limited (KRDCL) has been asked to probe the feasibility of laying a third-traction rail to source power(by fixing powerlines on the side of the rails) in orderto extend trains that terminate trips at Ernakulam Junction station to The...
more...

Harbour Terminus station had been renovated overfive years ago, in orderto resume
train services from the city. But the hassles associated with laying overhead powerlines and the inability to build an overbridge at Vathuruthy, to do away with level crossing in the area, led to the proposal being kept in abeyance.
Diverting a few trains from Ernakulam Junction to Harbour Terminus will in turn decongest the station and also help introduce new trains from the city. The terminus has in its vicinity an eight-track yard, a goods shed and two platforms. All this has been lying underutilised due to trains not calling at the station for well over a decade, Railway sources said.
They added that two other proposals, to build an integrated coaching terminal at a 100-acre yard owned by Railway in the Ponnurunni-Kathrikadavu area and anotherto renovate the
Old Railway Station located behind the High Court, could wait till the project to extend trains to the Terminus is realised. This is because the Terminus already has road access,
unlike the 100-acre yard.
An alternative to laying third track to source power would be to change the electric engine of trains to diesel, fortransit to Harbour Terminus. The problem is that the shunting process would incur a delay of 30 minutes, while the train would have to be parked at the
platform for this duration.

The Railway Ministry has given in-principle approval to introducing the much sought-after express trains from Mangaluru to Ahmedabad and Rameswaram. The only remaining thing to be done is the Ministry issuing notifications for the introduction of these services.
Since Ahmedabad Junction is already saturated, the Ministry is learnt to have decided to run the Mangaluru Central-Ahmedabad Service (about 1,340 km) till Bhavnagar (about 1,640 km) in Gujarat.
People in the region have long been demanding the introduction of these services connecting Mangaluru with Gujarat and the pilgrimage centre of Rameswaram in Tamil Nadu....
more...

Pashchima Karavali Rail Yatri Abhivriddhi Samithi president G. Hanumanth Kamath said that the demands were at least five years old. Dakshina Kannada MP Nalin Kumar Kateel recently wrote to the Railway Minister demanding introduction of these trains, he noted.
When asked, Divisional Railway Manager of Southern Railway’s Palakkad Division Trilok Kothari told The Hindu that the railway zones concerned approved the introduction of these trains as weekly services at the recent Indian Railway Time Table Committee (IRTTC) meeting.However, lots of preliminary work, including arranging rakes, locomotives, deciding timings, etc., has to be carried out. Finding available paths too is crucial, he said.
Mr. Kamath said that the coast districts have strong business ties with Gujarat and hundreds of people travel regularly between the regions for business purposes, including trading in arecanut and building material. Similarly, over 1,500 Gujarati families have settled down in Mangaluru and they too needed direct connectivity.
On the other hand, there is no direct train connectivity between Mangaluru and the pilgrimage centre of Rameswaram. Thousands of pilgrims from the region have to interchange trains to reach Rameswaram either at Madurai (Dadar-Tirunelveli Weekly Express), Coimbatore (Mangaluru Central-Coimbatore Intercity Express) or at Tiruchirapalli (Mangaluru Central-Puduchery Weekly Express and Mangaluru Central-Chennai Egmore Daily Express), he noted.
The distance between Mangaluru and Rameswaram is about 810 km on the shortest route by road and about 900 km by rail on the shortest route.
As Mr. Kateel had taken the initiative of demanding introduction of these services, the samithi is confident that the MP will take the issue to the logical end by urging the Railway Minister to introduce the services at the earliest, Mr. Kamath said.
The samithi will soon meet the MP with a request in this regard, he added.

The originating and terminating points of two pairs of trains between Bengaluru & Kerala & one between Bengaluru & Patna have been shifted from Banaswadi to this terminal, turning nightmare for many.Loud chants of 'Bharat Mata ki Jai' and 'Vande Mataram' rent the air accompanied by whistles and claps on Platform 1 of the brand new Sir M Visvesvaraya Bengaluru (SMVB) terminal as the SMVB-Ernakulam Triweekly Express departed at 7.51 pm.However, it turned out to be a nightmare for over 50 passengers as they landed at the Banaswadi railway station, which had been the starting point for the train for so long. Railways arranged to bring them here by a MEMU train and a BMTC bus to catch the new train.
The...
more...

originating and terminating points of two pairs of trains between Bengaluru and Kerala and one between Bengaluru and Patna have been shifted from Banaswadi to this Rs 314-crore terminal from June 6.
“The train has been booked 100 per cent. Nearly 150 passengers out of the total carrying capacity of the train of 1,098 passengers left from SMVB while the rest will board at K R Puram and Bangarpet,” said Divisional Railway Manager Shyam Singh.
The Bengaluru Railway Division insists all the reserved ticket passengers were alerted about the change of venue through SMSs and emails. Senior Divisional Commercial Manager Krishna Reddy said, “For the last one week, the commercial team has alerted every passenger who has booked tickets on the trains which have been shifted here. However, we expected some people to reach Banaswadi as this is the first day following the shifting of the terminal and so we had BMTC buses there on standby. Approximately 50 passengers were brought here by the Banaswadi-Kuppam MEMU while three travellers were brought by a BMTC bus.”
Among those on board was Pramod Pillai, a retired employee from HAL. He told TNIE, “The platform and the station are fantastic. But look at the state of the train. It is so dirty. When the Railways can spend so much, they might as well put a better rake for passenger comfort. Just go inside and see.” His daughter-in-law, Rashmi R, an advocate with Deloitte, charged, “This is the case with all Kerala-bound trains whenever I have travelled. Look at trains heading to Tamil Nadu. They are so well-maintained and in very good condition.”
Railway expert Krishna Prasad too expressed his unhappiness over a new train not being launched here. “I am glad that it has finally started. However, am disappointed that a new train has not been launched, say to Mumbai on the opening day. This is an old train, an old unwanted baby. We wanted to see a new train from here,” he said.
Retired army man N D Antappan, his wife Jeena Mathew and son C A Albert made a dash from Banaswadi station by hiring a cab and reached here. Jeena said, “What a surprise this station is. We had packed food assuming we would start from Banaswadi where literally nothing is available. This station has everything. Antappan added, “We got a cup of coffee just for Rs 10 and it was excellent and we had two cups!” while his son said he was extremely happy to see such a classy station.
Athira, an artiste said, “The station is very cool and very neat. We came to see off someone and I initially thought we had landed at the airport. Brothers Sasikumar and P Vijayakumar came over just to see the first train leave the station after reading and hearing about it. “It is excellent. We are very happy we came over,” said Vijayakumar.

Ending a two-decade-long wait, the double line traffic on the rail track in the Ernakulam-Kottayam-Kayamkulam section formally commenced on Sunday night. Tirunelveli-bound Palaruvi Express from Palakkad was the first train to run on the new track after the completion of the 16.7-km stretch between Ettumanoor and Chingavanam.
With this the entire track in Kerala via Kottayam has been doubled except for 1.2 km. The work for the doubling of rail lines south of Ernakulam started in 2001. At first, the railway authorities sanctioned doubling of lines between Ernakulam and Mulathuruthi.
Later approval...
more...

was given in different phases for doubling of lines in Mulanthuruthy-Kuruppanthara, Chingavanam-Kuruppanthara, Chengannur-Chingavanam, Mavelikkara- Chengannur and Kayamkulam-Mavelikkara sections.
Though work got delayed in all stretches, the 26-km Kuruppanthara-Chingavanam sector was the last one to be completed. It took 15 years for completion after getting approval in 2007. Problems related to land acquisition, endless litigations and technical issues forced the railways to revise the deadline several times.
With the completion of the double line track, the practice of holding trains in stations for crossing will come to an end. "Now, the efficiency of the trains will be increased. With the issuance of a new railway time table by October, we hope that trains can save up to 30-45 minutes in the travel between Ernakulam and Kayamkulam via Kottayam," said Thomas Chazhikadan MP.
Facelift for Kottayam station
With the doubling of the track, Kottayam railway station has got a facelift. The Kottayam station will now have six platforms (Platform 1 to 6) and a sub-platform 1-A as a terminus for passenger trains and MEMU. The sixth platform will be for goods trains.
"Kottayam and Nemom Terminuses were approved in the 2011 Railway Budget. Kottayam can now become a terminal station if a pit line is constructed in Chingavanam. By the time, trains can be commenced from Kottayam on 'Platform Return' basis," said Thomas Simon, general secretary, Western Indian Passengers’ Association.
100 kmph soon
Approved speed between Ettumanoor and Chingavanam to be increased up to 100 kmph after a few months
First platform in Kottayam railway station to become operational by June 15. Work in its yard is pending. Until then, platforms two and three will be operated for trains from south and north sides, respectively.

After a delay of over a year, the Sir M Visvesvaraya Terminal in Byappanahalli is all set for a grand opening on
June 6. While the news of the inaugural has been a celebration for rail enthusiasts, Bengalureans around the area
worry about rising traffic congestion in future.
However, the South Western Railways noted that only three pairs of trains would be running for...
more...

now, with an
expected footfall of less than 5,000.
“There will be traffic once the terminal will be opened. The engineer of the ndian Oil Corporation (IOC) flyover
hadn’t planned for this railway terminal.
Now it’s only two lanes but it should have been at least a three-lane flyover. Unless the flyover is widened, there
will be a major bottleneck.” said a resident, Jude Rajesh.
“People coming from Kammanahalli or Banaswadi usually want to reach the Banaswadi flyover. Without the
adequate infrastructure, the footfall from even one train will cause a jam on the road. Each train will contain at
least 1,400 passengers and it’s going to be a nightmare. Even if only 50 per cent want to go North or East
Bengaluru, 700 people will be scurrying to catch cabs and private vehicles,” said another resident of the area,
Dev Anand.
On condition of anonymity, another resident aired accessibility concerns. “The terminal is a great move, but the
question is how they are they going to manage incoming and outgoing traffic? It should not be a case where
people have to miss trains. The whole idea for another terminal is to decongest the city but they have to get the
logistics right.
New terminal a traffic bane?
East Bengaluru will be most hit if traffic congestion begins there. Some alternate arrangements should have been
made to facilitate the free flow of traffic, said Rajashekar, a resident.
Speaking to BM, SWR PRO, Aneesh Hegde said, “One round of expansion of the main road in front of the
terminal connecting Old Madras roadside to Banaswadi side has already been done. Right now, we are only
shifting three pairs of trains and so the traffic in front of the traffic will be minimal. Each train will get around
800-900 passengers.”
To reduce the possible traffic congestion, BBMP has made some immediate and long-term plans as well.
The IOC flyover needs to be widened to prevent traffic congestion
–Jude Rajesh, a resident
“The railway station that will see at least one lakh footfall in full capacity that needs to be supplemented with
adequate infrastructure. Currently, the terminal lacks a mobility plan. As an immediate measure, we can
complete a 50-75 metre L-shaped road by using railway land to facilitate commuters from Maruthi Seva Nagar
to reach Banaswadi and the railway overpass has been completed.
“For long term decongestion, we have made some plans; for 1 lakh footfall, you need at least 80-100 feet road.
Adjoining the railways, there are three modes: railway lines, suburban rail, and elevated flyover traffic. We need
to find a solution to connect all of them with minimal land acquisition,” said BS Prahalad, Chief Engineer (Road
and Infrastructure), BBMP.
According to him, BBMP has proposed the Elevated Rotary overpass similar to the Chennai model at a proposed
cost of Rs 250 crore. It took six months to come up with this idea and is not yet in the action plan. We have also
proposed a travelator connecting the railway terminal to Vivekananda Metro station, he said