Indian Railways Thread (Dec 2015)

vsunder · Post by **vsunder** » 03 May 2016 19:05

While everyone was focused on Shaktiman, Gatimaan, what man and Talgo, etc etc, history was quietly made. The first fully loaded freight rolled down a 56 km section of the Eastern DFC between Durgwati-Sasaram loaded with clinkers for the cement industry. The line has not been certified by CRS yet but this is imminent. Part of the issue is there are no standards in place for what norms are relevant for safety on the DFC corridors.

http://wap.business-standard.com/articl ... 065_1.html

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 03 May 2016 19:30

vsunder, actually someone already mentioned the limited DFC trials about 3 pages ago

Meanwhile IR is having trouble with its trainset initiative:
Bidders ditch Indian Railways' Rs 2,500 crore train-sets tender

In what is set to further delay Indian Railways' plans to adopt train-sets or Electrical Multiple Units (EMUs) for faster inter-city travel, none of the five short-listed bidders for railways' Rs 2,500 crore tender submitted quote by Tuesday, the last date for bid submission.

The train-set project was announced by Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu in his budget speech last year as a major step towards achieving the targets under the government's Make in India initiative. "None of the five bidders have submitted their bids. The companies have asked for increasing the quantum of work under the tender. The Railway Board will now re-examine the proposal," a senior rail ministry official told Business Standard.

A train-set, much like the Delhi Metro trains, comprises many coaches that are individually powered by a propulsion system eliminating the need for locomotives. Indian Railways had floated the Rs 2,500 crore global tender for procurement-cum-maintenance and manufacture of 15 train-sets with 315 coaches or cars in June last year. The successful bidder is allowed to procure two prototype train sets and the subsequent train sets will have to be manufactured in India under the Make in India initiative.

Five bidders had qualified the initial round in November 2015 including the consortia of CAF & Bombardier; Hitachi with Ansaldo & Kawasaki; Toshiba with state-run Bharat Heavy Electricals; Alstom with government-owned Bharat Earth Movers; and Siemens alone. The bidders had to submit their bids by 2 May, the last date, after at least two extensions of the deadline in December and February. The bidders are understood to have asked for raising the tender size to 1,000 coaches to make the project viable.

The ministry wants to procure two types of EMU train sets comprising 20 rail cars with sleeper arrangement and 16 rail cars with sitting arrangement. The winning bidder will have a maintenance obligation for seven years out of its life of 35 years after which the maintenance will be undertaken by Indian Railways. The depot site for EMU train sets is proposed to be near Ghaziabad on Northern Railway.

The EMU train-sets will operate at speeds of upto 160 km per hour. Indian Railways plans to introduce the modern EMU train-sets for running premium Shatabdi and Rajdhani trains without any additional expenditure on existing track and signaling infrastructure.

arshyam · Post by **arshyam** » 04 May 2016 05:44

sohamn wrote:
Singha wrote:anyone know the ORBAT of IR in terms of inventory of diesel and electric locos.

be interesting to know what % is WAP4,5,7 and WDP4

see -
http://24coaches.com/wdp-wdg-alco-emd-descriptions/
http://24coaches.com/indian-railways-wdm-series/
http://24coaches.com/ac-electric-locomo ... wam-class/
http://www.irfca.org/apps/locos/list

You may have to do some data transformation to get the numbers right.

IR officially provides the data in the public domain:

http://elocos.railnet.gov.in/Holding/holding_04_16.pdf
http://elocos.railnet.gov.in/Loco_bank/shedwise.aspx

Code: Select all

AC			4113
AC/DC			85
3-Phase			1027
	IGBT 	337
	GTO	690
Grand Total 		5225

I couldn't find a similar detailed write up from the mech dept (which runs the diesels), so have rely on the statistical summary from last year.

http://fois.indianrail.gov.in/railwaybo ... et_Eng.pdf

Code: Select all

Rolling Stock (in units)–
Locomotives:
Steam        43
Diesel         5714
Electric       5016

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 04 May 2016 07:02

11,000 BG locos is a considerable holding by any std.

i wonder where the steams are - mainline steam was EOL more than a decade ago - must be the ooty, darjeeling and shimla narrow gauge ops.

vsunder · Post by **vsunder** » 04 May 2016 07:36

Singha wrote:11,000 BG locos is a considerable holding by any std.

i wonder where the steams are - mainline steam was EOL more than a decade ago - must be the ooty, darjeeling and shimla narrow gauge ops.

There are a number of steam locos used for special runs, heritage locos. There are for example working WP's housed at Alwar loco shed. The WP's were in the Rail Museum in Chankayapuri, but at least last November when I visited the museum, I was told the WP's in the collection were now in Alwar and restored to working condition. There are few other places where steam locos have been restored. For instance the massive Beyer-Garratt's of SER have been restored and are housed in Kharagpur. Kalka-Shimla is dieselized, and the Ooty and Darjeeling locos will not add up to 43. There is a Beyer-Garratt with its 16 driving wheels at the Rail Museum in Chanakyapuri and it is being restored but as a static display unlike the KGP one which from time to time is taken out for a spin.

ldev · Post by **ldev** » 04 May 2016 16:14

Suraj wrote:
Meanwhile IR is having trouble with its trainset initiative:
Bidders ditch Indian Railways' Rs 2,500 crore train-sets tender

I think this is a setback. Because the real target should be to increase the average speed of trains end to end rather than aim for a maximum top speed. And as Suraj posted earlier, the acceleration figure for a EMU trainset is multiple times that of a traditional end engine. Just look at the Mumbai EMU trains and their acceleration. With numerous stops, slowdowns because of track issues, overtaking etc., quick acceleration is very important. Was reading somewhere, that on the Tokyo Osaka line, even the slowest trains with 15 stops on the 515 kilometer route have an average end to end speed of 128 kmph. Just shows the importance of quick acceleration. Those trains reach 200 kmph in 2-3 minutes from start. Existing IR locos take 10 minutes to reach 100 kmph.

Ideally IR needs Talgo technology for EMU train sets but with coach capacity in line with the Shinkanset train sets i.e. about 1300 passengers in a 16 car train set (chair car style). Adding a 3rd and 4th line on certain routes is a longer term proposition. In the interim, a Talgo technology based EMU trainset but with Japanese style passenger capacity per trainset will help increase average speeds with the least amount of time and investment.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 04 May 2016 20:28

ldev wrote:I think this is a setback. Because the real target should be to increase the average speed of trains end to end rather than aim for a maximum top speed. And as Suraj posted earlier, the acceleration figure for a EMU trainset is multiple times that of a traditional end engine. Just look at the Mumbai EMU trains and their acceleration.

It depends on more factors. Ideally yes EMUs accelerate faster. But the French TGVs and Spanish Talgo AVEs are not, and they're no slouches either. IR hasn't yet maximized its high power passenger electric locomotive options. It's probably considered cheaper to build loco-based rather than train-set based, considering this train-set tender itself failed because of viability issues. That is an economic signal that IR may have mis-priced what it a viable price for trainsets. EMUs are more expensive than loco based, and have greater maintenance needs. They may choose to go with tilting Talgo trains pulled by locos, instead of trainsets.

I've never taken the Kodama service (the one that stops at every stop) on the Tokaido Shinkansen between Tokyo and Osaka, but it does take 4hrs, which translates to 128km/h average.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 04 May 2016 20:38

For now powerful tgv style engines are best bet.

No matter what the type, hsr speed need aerospace grade construction...so semi hsr is best systemwide

A Nandy · Post by **A Nandy** » 05 May 2016 22:53

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/ind ... 107014.cms

NEW DELHI: The Ministry of Railways has proposed a tariff for the upcoming bullet train service between Mumbai and Ahmedabad that will be 1.5 times more than the first class AC fare prevailing now.

In Duronto Express, for example, the current AC 1st Class fare between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, is Rs 2,200. This means, for the 508-km run between the two cities -- via a dedicated, high-speed corridor -- the fare will be around Rs 3,300.

In Japan, a similar, 550-km run between Tokyo and Osaka on the Shinkansen, as the bullet train network there is called -- and on which the Indian service is being modelled -- costs around Rs 8,500.

In a written reply in the Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Railways Manoj Sinha said the first phase of the Indian network will have a maximum design speed of 350 km per hour and an operating speed of 320 km per hour.

The ministry expects around 36,000 daily users ...

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 06 May 2016 03:54

Freight Corridor Corp to award Rs 14,000-cr contracts in FY17

Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation (DFCC), the Indian Railways' arm implementing the ambitious freight corridor project, will award contracts worth Rs 14,000 crore in the current financial year (2016-17) in a bid to quickly wrap up work and meet the 2019 deadline for commissioning the Rs 82,000-crore project.

"By July 2016, we are going to place orders worth Rs 10,000 crore. The balance - around Rs 4,000 crore worth of contracts - will be placed in the rest of the current financial year itself. After this, work will be progressing in every section of DFCC," said a senior executive.

He added the company has so far placed 76 per cent of the contracts for civil works and 63 per cent of electrical contracts, apart from 48 per cent of the total signalling contracts.

Railways to set up wing to ramp up non-tariff revenue

Three months after Rail Minister Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu emphasised upon the need for Indian Railways to shore up earnings from non-traditional areas, including non-tariff revenue sources in his Budget speech, the railway ministry has set up a dedicated wing with the mandate to focus on non-fare box revenue.

The non-fare box revenue (NFR) directorate would look at advertisements at stations, commercial exploitation of vacant land and space rights over station buildings, including station redevelopment, advertisements on coaches and locos, sponsorship of uniforms for railway personnel, hoardings on land alongside tracks, commercial farming along tracks, monetisation of soft assets, including revenue from advertisements on websites and parking of vehicles on railway land, among other things. The directorate will draw officers from engineering, traffic-commercial and finance departments. The wing will be headed by a Director-NFR-Finance and all its officers will report to the chairman of the Railway Board.

“We earn less than five per cent of revenue through non-tariff sources. Many of the world railway systems generate 10-20 per cent of their revenue from non-tariff sources. Over a period of next five years, we will strive to reach this world-average by monetising assets and undertaking other revenue yielding activities,” Prabhu had said. Indian Railways had, last month, appointed global consultancy firm Ernst & Young (EY) to help mop up advertising revenue worth over Rs 5,000 crore in the next few years.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 06 May 2016 07:43

Railways should imo monetize the strategic location of its stations and surplus urban land not through cheaper hotels but through a mix of Ginger + 3* hotels ... these will sell , given the locations and proximity to food, commercial areas ...

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 06 May 2016 18:52

biodigester vacuum toilet fitted to cab of loco

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ChxlQK6XAAAVIMx.jpg

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 06 May 2016 18:54

Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) today asserted that Tripura will soon be connected with Delhi by superfast trains besides, regular service to Silchar, Guwahati and Kolkata.Lok Sabha MPs from Tripura Jitendra Choudhury and Shankar Prasad Datta were also assured by Union Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu yesterday that Ministry of Railway has been actively working on connecting Tripura capital with national capital and other important cities by this month.

The MPs told the media here that the Tripura government has long been persuading to connect the state with major cities of the country on daily basis including Delhi, Kolkata, Chennai and Mumbai and to run sufficient local trains connecting north Tripura with West and South Tripura.

State Transport Secretary Samarjit Bhowmik said NFR authority has been trying hard to flag off train service from Agartala after ongoing election process gets over by May 19.However, maintenance facility of trains has not been created at Agartala railway station and as a result Agartala has to be in regular fleet to Silchar till installation of maintenance yard scheduled in September next. For maintenance of long run trains from Tripura, NF Railway has been working on an alternative arrangement with Northern Railway to provide maintenance facility, Mr Bhowmik said, adding that NFR is also pursuing with Railway board over the demands of the state.He, however, pointed out that NFR officials have been working on war footing in hill section of Badarpur-Lumbding route to restore the railway service as soon as possible. NFR has cancelled trains running between Guwahati and Silchar due to heavy rains and landslide that dislocated the railway track

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 06 May 2016 18:54

new water dispenser

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ChwRuCAVAAEG1ko.jpg

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 06 May 2016 18:54

ET NOW ‏@ETNOWlive 1h1 hour ago
#WiFi in 400 Railway stns by next year & will have the fastest speed among public WiFis in the world: @sureshpprabhu

Supratik · Post by **Supratik** » 06 May 2016 19:29

No progress on the 400 station modernization in PPP mode plan. No progress on land monetization that is now largely encroached by slums making using IR an ugly experience for both tourists and domestic passengers. These are the two areas that SP has failed to address so far.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 06 May 2016 23:32

Indian Railways attracts Rs.42,000cr FDI

Government today said Indian railways has attracted foreign direct investment (FDI) to the tune of Rs 42,000 crore and will soon float tenders for manufacturing rail coaches in the country.

“Indian Railways has been able to attract one of the largest FDIs in terms of placing orders. Two of the top companies, one European and one American, with the contract value as high as Rs 42,000 crore. This is the largest FDI in terms of contract,” Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu said.

India needs a stable source of investment and FDI is one of those, he said, adding that the government is also planning to build new dedicated freight corridors that will again attract investment.

Supratik · Post by **Supratik** » 07 May 2016 17:35

The majority of that FDI is perhaps in the DFCs.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 07 May 2016 18:22

Ukstan had made noises of funding a new mumbai to blr dfc but true to form, nothing happened.

saip · Post by **saip** » 07 May 2016 19:19

I was at Chennai Central a couple of weeks back. it is really a dump. Hundreds of people sleeping on the ground and on the chairs and stray dogs all over. There used to be a paid waiting room somewhere but the porter said it is closed for 'renovation'. Only other waiting room somewhere upstairs but he did not know if there is an elevator. We wend our way carefully stepping over 'bodies' and sit on two chairs. Garbage and empty bottles on the ground. No one seems to be worried about putting them in garbage cans.

Finally, we go to the platform 1 when our train pulls in (Garibi Rath). There again lots of gravel, sand and bricks dumped on the platform blocking most of as some construction seem to be going on. Why can't they bring it when it is needed?

One good thing. The train leaves on time and reaches our destination (300 km north) 10 minutes ahead with one stop. First hour it covered 70km and the rest of the time it averaged 92 km. It did most of the time 105-110 km with a peak of 120km.

Then I found out the meaning of RAC (reserved against cancellation0. Railways sell two tickets for each berth against this quota. In our compartment 10 tickets were issued against 5 berths most of them to Delhi.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 07 May 2016 19:25

Supratik wrote:The majority of that FDI is perhaps in the DFCs.

Specifically in the locomotive plants . Minister Prabhu is talking about the GE diesel loco plant and Alstom electric loco one when he talks about Americans and Europeans.

SanjayC · Post by **SanjayC** » 07 May 2016 19:26

saip wrote:Then I found out the meaning of RAC (reserved against cancellation0. Railways sell two tickets for each berth against this quota. In our compartment 10 tickets were issued against 5 berths most of them to Delhi.

If RAC is not confirmed, then you get a seat, not a berth.

saip · Post by **saip** » 07 May 2016 19:53

SanjayC wrote:
saip wrote:Then I found out the meaning of RAC (reserved against cancellation0. Railways sell two tickets for each berth against this quota. In our compartment 10 tickets were issued against 5 berths most of them to Delhi.
If RAC is not confirmed, then you get a seat, not a berth.

But our compartment is 3 tier. Each seat is attached to a berth. So how can they just get a seat without a berth? Or do they give these tickets to only side seats? So during the night time (between 9 pm and 6 am) when the upper berth guy sleeps above the two side seats are occupied by the RAC ticket holders?

SanjayC · Post by **SanjayC** » 07 May 2016 19:55

Yes. They get side seats - one each.

vsunder · Post by **vsunder** » 07 May 2016 20:11

The main point of concern is the Eastern DFC between Son Nagar(Bihar) and Dankuni( West Bengal). GoI wants to develop this as PPP. No contract has been issued for this sector and terrain wise this is the most involved. I doubt it can be completed in 2019 or whatever that the GoI has announced for completion for DFC. Anybody who has traveled on this route knows that you are traversing the ghat sections of the Chotta-Nagpur Hills beginning at the tiny station of Gujhandi where bankers are on standby for heavy freight, the end of the ghat section is at another tiny station Gurpa, if memory serves me right . This is the Grand Chord through Gaya, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose Gomoh Jn( Yes that is the full name apres Lallu when he was RM, since NSC boarded Kalka Mail here on his way to Peshawar and Kabul) Dhanbad and joining the mainline(via Patna) at Asansol. There are tunnels a few on this ghat section of the Grand Chord. Absolutely no way this can be done in even 3 years and no contract has been issued for this part yet. Kalka Mail, the Rajdhanis from HWH take this route all the time and you can watch any video to see the terrain. It's also fun to take this route to Delhi in blackout conditions in unreserved 3rd class(yes there was that class then) as a 16 year old as I did during the Bangladesh war of 1971. Some hot tea at 2am at Gaya revives you.

Western DFC I think the Iqbalgarh-Vadodara section is not quite fully wrapped up but OK, the terrain is not that bad, land acquisition is the hurdle here. Vadodara-Sachin also I believe the tenders are floated, but JICA has to approve everything on western DFC. Ludhiana-Khurja there is no contractor, though this is funded by World Bank and the connector Dadri-Rewari Eastern to Western DFC link the contractor is not finalized. There will be some tunnel here I believe, under some spur of the Arravalli.
It will be a massive tunnel, remember western DFC will carry double stacked containers

The western DFC has an alignment close to the Delhi-Ahmedabad route, but past Jaipur. So beyond Jaipur and to Abu Rd. , Iqbalgarh and Palanpur, Mehsana the Western DFC will be close to the Delhi-Ahmedabad route. IR tracks here are single lined after Jaipur towards AHMD and it is a rare section as the Swaran Jayanthi between Delhi and Ahmedabad is diesel hauled by a Vatwa based WDM3 usually. But you can see from videos that doubling is proceeding quite fast on IR tracks beyond Abu Road towards Palanpur and Mehsana. Mehsana still has quaint semaphore signals for the meter gauge tracks still there.
No sign of electric traction poles yet. There is a paucity of videos of earthwork taking place on DFC on this section too, so cannot estimate how rapid is the progress, unlike what I have seen first hand between Khurja and Kanpur a few months ago and what people have posted between Son Nagar and Mughalsarai.

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 07 May 2016 20:11

Did you go to college in india when? Anyone from 80s onward would know what rac is...

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 07 May 2016 20:20

Vsunder sir why not route the dfc via much easier land along eastern bihar route toward ghy, turn south at kishanganj jn and head to hwh via malda and bolpur?

Sounds much easier than a million ton of civil work in the hills....

vsunder · Post by **vsunder** » 07 May 2016 20:32

Singha wrote:Vsunder sir why not route the dfc via much easier land along eastern bihar route toward ghy, turn south at kishanganj jn and head to hwh via malda and bolpur?

Sounds much easier than a million ton of civil work in the hills....

I am going over what the DFC has announced as the route, remember that it has to touch Dhanbad, Gomoh, Jharia, the coalfields. You can see the maps of the announced route. If they change the map, OK then the terrain changes. The DFC trains will be longer and heavier axle loads, so the quicker they get onto dedicated tracks the better. In fact Gomoh is a declared junction between DFC and IR tracks. After that the next junction with IR towards WB is at Andal and then the terminus at Dankuni. The alignment past Son Nagar runs slightly North of the Grand Chord tracks but then dips back to connect with Grand Chord at Gomoh.
If you look at the map, there is the Parasnath Hills to the North of Gomoh and so I do not think there is an easy way out, you dig that's it. The PPP sector is also not peanuts, it is 538km from Son Nagar to Dankuni, fully 1/3 of the length of the Eastern DFC. My impression is that they are having difficulties with acquiring a partner for this stretch. Maybe it will be resolved soon. Going west from Gomoh, the declared IR junctions with EDFC are at Ganj Khwaja and then Son Nagar. Right now they have temporary junctions with IR at Sasaram and Durgawati that will be removed once the 118km section between Son Nagar and Mughalsarai is operational. Incidentally this 118km section is the only section on the DFC's that is entirely funded by GoI.

ritesh · Post by **ritesh** » 07 May 2016 21:03

Suraj wrote: IR hasn't yet maximized its high power passenger electric locomotive options. It's probably considered cheaper to build loco-based rather than train-set based, considering this train-set tender itself failed because of viability issues. That is an economic signal that IR may have mis-priced what it a viable price for trainsets. EMUs are more expensive than loco based, and have greater maintenance needs. They may choose to go with tilting Talgo trains pulled by locos, instead of trainsets.

Have a suggestion, do not know whether it is viable. Currently for Mumbai, the EMU has 4 propulsion in 12 coach and 5 for 15 coach rakes. So, for flatter plains, they can try to come up with 24 coach rake, which has 12 propulsion coach. Though the carrying capacity is reduced by a third, but still could be adequate on flat topology. The new Bombardier rakes are quite effective and are rated for 110kmph while the Siemens was rated at 100kpmh. So this could be doable, atleast on testing basis.

saip · Post by **saip** » 07 May 2016 21:28

Singha wrote:Did you go to college in india when? Anyone from 80s onward would know what rac is...

That explains. I moved to the US in 80s.

vsunder · Post by **vsunder** » 08 May 2016 02:14

I had a chance to look at my copy of the 2015 Great Indian Railway Atlas. Indeed so, DFC hugs Grand Chord tightly.
Starting from Delhi it is to your right, so that is where you should sit to get ring side seats. All the way to Bhaupur outside Kanpur, then it is seen going off into the boonies while you enter Kanpur. In the boonies it cuts the Kanpur-Jhansi line at Bhimsen, maybe an IR junction there and still keeps to the right and again re-appears next to the current alignment after Kanpur near Chakeri(IAF station Chakeri of days of yore and now HAL Kanpur), till Ganj Khwaja in Mughalsarai where it has an IR Jn and shifts to the left. Now begins the Grand Chord after Mughalsarai, Sasaram, Son Nagar, Gaya are all Grand Chord stations. After Gaya if you see the maps released by DFC corp, you will see the DFC alignment has a sharp beak, that is the new DFC alignment, straightening a tiny bit the Gurpa-Gujhandi ghat section. The beak is unmistakeable and you cannot miss it in the published map.
The original alignment in the ghats has way too many twists and turns and tunnels, maybe GPS and better topography analysis has allowed them a better route and modern methods makes viaduct construction very feasible as opposed to the old days. Also with heavier freight it helps to have a nice uniform gradient and less restrictions on speed. But it is only a miniscule difference with the old alignment. Then in the middle of the ghat it again hugs the old alignment still on the left according to the Great Indian Railway Atlas and keeps hugging it past Koderma, Hazaribagh rd and on to Gomoh Jn. DFC has its own stations and go by the name of New XXX, so we have New Bhaupur outside Kanpur etc. They are not connected to IR but have their own set of loop lines. I recall these "new" stations are set up 10km apart. It is not possible the DFC will be commissioned in 3 years, large sections have their tenders just floated and the current sections even though work pace has picked up there is a huge amount of work left. I think come next election time, one will have Delhi(really Khurja)-Kanpur(Bhaupur)/ commissioned, Mughalsarai-Son Nagar that is at an advanced stage commissioned, Iqbalgarh-Rewari 640km commissioned western DFC, maybe Sachin to Vaitarna on western DFC. I even doubt Kanpur-Mughalsarai will be commissioned, the tender was awarded only last year to GMR infra for earthwork, there is systems work and OHE, given the pace of western DFC and eastern dfc, even after Modi, I simply think it is not possible. Regarding other sections tenders have been not been awarded. There is also land acquisition issues in UP and Panjab, Gujarat. I think another 5-6 years to completion. That is more realistic.

JTull · Post by **JTull** » 08 May 2016 03:24

saip wrote:I was at Chennai Central a couple of weeks back. it is really a dump. Hundreds of people sleeping on the ground and on the chairs and stray dogs all over. There used to be a paid waiting room somewhere but the porter said it is closed for 'renovation'. Only other waiting room somewhere upstairs but he did not know if there is an elevator. We wend our way carefully stepping over 'bodies' and sit on two chairs. Garbage and empty bottles on the ground. No one seems to be worried about putting them in garbage cans.

Finally, we go to the platform 1 when our train pulls in (Garibi Rath). There again lots of gravel, sand and bricks dumped on the platform blocking most of as some construction seem to be going on. Why can't they bring it when it is needed?

One good thing. The train leaves on time and reaches our destination (300 km north) 10 minutes ahead with one stop. First hour it covered 70km and the rest of the time it averaged 92 km. It did most of the time 105-110 km with a peak of 120km.

Then I found out the meaning of RAC (reserved against cancellation0. Railways sell two tickets for each berth against this quota. In our compartment 10 tickets were issued against 5 berths most of them to Delhi.

Tweet @RainMinIndia and @sureshpprabhu. That seems to get things moving, esp on cleanliness front

Prasad · Post by **Prasad** » 08 May 2016 12:55

're central: there are tons of people transiting through that place that it's impossible to build enough waiting rooms. There are two main halls where most people wait. Those are almost always full. The station has> 10 platforms that are almost always busy. So people sleeping n all is not surprising. Unless we have air type connections this will be the norm in the future too. As for cleanliness I went through it yesterday and it was ok. Not airport level but ladies better than what it used to be. Although they still have random water leakage on the platforms and all sorts of construction material dumped for ongoing work.

Sachin · Post by **Sachin** » 09 May 2016 10:24

saip wrote:I was at Chennai Central a couple of weeks back. it is really a dump. Hundreds of people sleeping on the ground and on the chairs and stray dogs all over. There used to be a paid waiting room somewhere but the porter said it is closed for 'renovation'. Only other waiting room somewhere upstairs but he did not know if there is an elevator. We wend our way carefully stepping over 'bodies' and sit on two chairs. Garbage and empty bottles on the ground. No one seems to be worried about putting them in garbage cans.

This was one 'sad thing' which I too noticed at MAS

. My return flight from Port Blair landed at MAA by 1200Hrs and my train was only at 1730Hrs. Reached MAS at around 1330Hrs. The only "waiting room" seems to be on the first floor (near the MCO and RPF rooms), and there were no escalators of lifts. So for people with huge luggage this would be a problem. And looks like there are lots of people who just occupy the waiting room for hours together. I could see wet clothes put on the seats, and balcony railings for drying. The toilets were functional but not very clean. The over all feeling was that from the good Andamans, we have just got into a refugee camp. One police man from the RPF was there on duty.

The waiting room facilities could certainly be improved. People would be even willing to pay for some good clean facility. I had tried to book a "retiring room", but those were not available (when I checked online).

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 09 May 2016 12:21

what you need is something like the IRCTC executive lounge in NDLS. 50/per hr/person after a flat fee first 2 hrs.
check google for photos.
19 more stations are scheduled to get it.

this is orthogonal to the issue of keeping the main free waiting lounges sunny, spacious, neat , secure and comfortable.

kapilrdave · Post by **kapilrdave** » 09 May 2016 16:41

IMO cleanliness, people sleeping on platforms, waiting rooms or even the speed of the trains should be least of the govt's concern when millions and millions of passengers are travelling like cattle in unreserved coaches (sometimes even in reserved coaches as well) on daily basis. They don't mind the train reaching 2-3 hours later. What they need is more than 6 inch space to stand on!

Recently I missed my train from Delhi to Varanasi so I had the privilege to travel in a general coach of another train. Personally, it wasn't really like the sky falling over my head since I've done a lot of travelling in these cattle carriers in my childhood but it wasn't the same with my family. I was actually excited about the prospects of reliving my childhood and also giving my "sahebzada" (my son

) a dekho of what poor people's daily life is like. Eventually we traveled sitting on the luggage rack on the top bowing the back C shaped for 13 hours

. Unlike many others in the coach, we were lucky enough to get a seat - well if you can call it a "seat"

. We were 31 people travelling in a 8 people's compartment

. The entire coach had to keep supressed their chhee and pee for 13 long hours because there were 11 people sitting in the two toilets

and we had no space to climb down from the luggage rack. And all this in the hot summer in which we couldn't even drink water for the fear of susu

.

It pained me a lot, not only because I personally had to suffer all these. I actually partly relished reliving my struggle days (anyone routinely travelling from Surat to Mumbai in general coach would know what exactly "struggle" is). But it pained me more because even after all these years we cannot provide our citizens a humanly medium of travelling. It is not much different than what we see in the photographs of post independence era in which passengers travel even worse than cattle like situation. Of course it would pain me personally too if it wasn't a one off adventure for me.

For a minute I decided to take a pic and post it to the rail min but then I thought against it. I mean, why would I need to post this pic to the rail min himself? Doesn't he already know that these coaches are nothing better than the hell-on-wheels? I actually expected this govt to work more for the real issues like this than the unaffordable bullet trains.

I know there are practical problems in increasing the number of coaches in the train. But then, what's the solution?

IMO, EVERYTHING should be lesser priority than fixing this problem. Screw these hi-fi bullet trains ideas and all such airy fairy talks and just focus on providing a decent mode of travelling. Even in the sleeper coaches, tickets go unavailable the very first day in season. Why don't we just use our bullet train's budget in increasing the number of trains so that at least we give a chance to the citizens to travel like humans?

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 09 May 2016 18:29

the bullet train's share in IR's budget is zero. since it is effectively funded by loan from Japan.

we are a large enough economy to do BOTH,quality and quantity. let's not get into emotional arguments why HSR/SHSR project should be scrapped in order to fund capacity augmentation. it's not a zero sum game.

scrapping HSR doesnt ensure more sleeper coaches. FWIW, we dont have HSR now. does it mean we have adequate sleeper coaches ??

kapilrdave · Post by **kapilrdave** » 09 May 2016 19:08

^^ I'm okay as long as BOTH is done. But it certainly doesn't look like the focus is on expanding capacity (Or may be that part has not captured the headlines yet). I actually want the priority to be given to capacity augmentation than the HSR/SHSRs. But it seems reverse.

And no, it's not emotional argument. Millions of people are ACTUALLY suffering. What's emotional about it?

manjgu · Post by **manjgu** » 09 May 2016 19:21

totally agree @Kapilrdarve ..very well said.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 09 May 2016 19:51

kapilrdave wrote:^^ I'm okay as long as BOTH is done. But it certainly doesn't look like the focus is on expanding capacity (Or may be that part has not captured the headlines yet). I actually want the priority to be given to capacity augmentation than the HSR/SHSRs. But it seems reverse.

The nearly $100 billion that IR is spending on double/triple/quad tracking and signaling is primarily meant to help them increase line capacity, and give them the ability to run more trains and alleviate crowding. It doesn't seem like that right now because they're just talking of tracks and signals, but the lions share of their ongoing infrastructure building is targeted towards exactly what you complain of. As RahulM said, HSR is an entirely separate matter that's a Japanese FDI project. It's being unfairly targeted for criticism when IR has been clear its first priority has been to increase line capacity to run more trains.