Ramana: I barely post 10% of what I know what is happening on infra, much that I post is overwhelmed by one line rejoinders. On skyscrapercity forum I have driven the discussions there on DFC, on roads and railways. If you look at these forums you can see something very interesting. In the 2008 era, either these fora were comatose with a post every week or what new trains are to be started. Nothing on amenities. Now the forums are extremely alive.
It is only the big stations and their fancy renders and Vande Bharat that gets talked about. That is because the average reporter sees that. But go to Hindi, Tamil and Kannada and Telugu newspaper the reporters there tell you a huge amount as they are really boots on the ground.
For example when doubling of a line takes place, all the old wayside stations in god forsaken places get torn down and new stations are built and platforms raised to standard height. The old frame lever systems get replaced by electronic interlocking and the rural community gets many station amenities unknown to them in 70 years. Pradahan Mantri Gati Shakti logistics terminals, kisan rail to transport produce from one part of India to another so that farmers earn more income and of course the DFCs have all changed rural India in a way that sees ZERO comment from anybody on this forum with their fixations and rants and for that matter in the English press with their agendas.
Just take this week, at least 10 important rail projects were completed NONE of which made any newspaper. Next week it will be the same.
As the end of March deadline approaches and zones are compelled to use up their money there is a crescendo of Commissioner Railway Safety inspections to open new lines, doubling and railway electrification. Any government that come after this one has a very high benchmark.
But people are people. Karnataka infra forums are full of complaining people, all the time complaining about this and that even if they are given fantastic things the Bangalore crowd complains. You think I am making this up. They got a new bus terminal a few days ago in Kalasipalayam in Bangalore. Before buses parked on the road and restricted traffic around a dirty, dingy terminal. Look at the spanking new terminal and listen to the interview of a citizen of Bangalore, he only complains and never once talks about the new bus terminal.
To me he symbolizes the problem in Karnataka. See this is what I mean. But this is the sort of clueless person one has to deal with in Karnataka:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CHNJbruzS4
I know the Gowda and Lingayat communities only too well and all politics in Karnataka begins and ends with this community of farmers. I seriously believe they do not even know Karnataka has a coastline and a major port Mangalore. The calls from the coast for a Tulunadu keep growing because of the shenanigans.
PS: Kalasipalayam bus station originally was designed by a Jewish German architect who fled the Holocaust. He was the nephew of the German Physics Nobel laureate Max Born. Max Born was in India at IISc and suggested his name to Mysore Maharaja and so Otto Konigsberger came to Bangalore. Many of his designed buildings have been demolished. He designed the old Aerospace department building in IISc campus and the wind tunnel lab. The pavilion in Sir MN Krishna Rao Park where Shiv lives and also helped to design housing post independence for the Govt. of India to house refugees who flooded India post partition. Town planning for the future capital of Odisha, Bhubhaneswar and the buildings of the Tata Institute for Fundamental Research (TIFR) in Colaba in Mumbai at Homi Bhabha's behest. He also designed the Material Sciences and Metallurgy deptt building in IISc and the student canteen in IISc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_K%C3%B6nigsberger
PPS: Here are three of the 10 railway projects completed this week. 1. Jhansi to Kanpur 206 km is finally double lined 10 years late. An artery connecting North India to Chennai, Hyderabad and Mumbai it was at 200% over capacity and the deadly Pokhrayan accident early in Modi-1 took place on this route. Twice firms were blacklisted for non-performance. A major bridge across the Yamuna had to be built. One line is still over an 1883 bridge of the old Indian Midlands Railway. On Monday the last remaining 20km section for doubling went through safety inspection and now all 206 km is open for doubled traffic. It will also allow for better maintenance on a highly congested route which connects with EDFC outside Kanpur and a Gati Shakti container terminal where EDFC meets this line outside Kanpur which Dubai Ports wants to run.
2. The line connecting Mangalore to the Konkan railway runs through a tunnel built in 1970 by that old man I knew V. L. Roche. Went bankrupt building this tunnel. The tracks inside this tunnel have not been replaced for 40 years and there is a speed restriction of 20kmph for any train that comes along the Konkan railway and exits to Mangalore and Kerala. In the last 2 years doubling was done, a second tunnel excavated and when it was operationalized the old tunnel has been refurbished and old track uprooted and new tracks laid and soon speeds will be upped to 90 kmph at least.
3. In Karnataka maybe tomorrow PM Modi is going to inaugurate Sivamogga airport a pet project of former CM Yediyurappa. He will dedicate large sections of doubled line that finally double Belagavi to Bengaluru and the last 13km section was done in double quick time with line block and safety inspection taking place yesterday. Few days ago other sections of the Hubli to Miraj line were doubled leaving only a small 20km section for doubling and providing alternate routes for freight and passenger trains between Bengaluru and Mumbai. Honorable Railway Mantri is wrong here in his tweet it is Londa to Kudachi a distance of 155km and NOT 109 km as the tweet says, par kya karen,these people only read what their underlings tell them, cannot even read a damn map:
https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1629885779349749761
Almost 85% of the capacity addition on Indian Railways, lines to Northeast capitals and the rejuventaion of a dead DFC project under UPA where we now see a completion of the DFC projects by March 2024 are all due to one man Suresh Prabhu, no other railway minister had the foresight before and after him. Vaishnaw is just implementing Prabhu's program with some frills. Read it why believe me. PM Modi will also inaugurate kisan projects in Belagavi too. There is a desire to do much before model code of conduct comes into play.
Digital empowerment, jal jeevan and other programs have made a huge impact in rural India and in the urban poor. The effects of all this cannot be gauged sitting in a foreign country, boots on the ground....
For example in about a month 65 km of tracks will be doubled and speeds upped to 130kmph on the pilgrim circuit a sleepy branch line with god forsaken wayside stations and bad tracks. This is Lucknow--Ayodhya--Varanasi route. All those small wayside stations were demolished and new ones built, tracks improved to 60 kg/m density rails like main lines and lines doubled. VB can then be introduced. Pilgrims who travel on this route realize the convenience and saving in time. Other facets of infra are just too much to to detail here. In a year this pilgrim line will be doubled and maximum permissible speeds will be 130kmph. Not reported in the press so none of you know.
None know that the entire spine of India Delhi to Chennai is being tripled. Large sections in AP are tripled already and in MP and UP.