VELLORE: The Railways has proposed to provide "dedicated corridors" (separate tracks) for goods trains along the Golden Quadrilateral routes of the National Highways Authority of India in order to facilitate enhancement in the speed of goods and passenger trains, according to the Union Minister of State for Railways, R. Velu.

Talking to newspersons at the Walaja Road railway station near Ranipet on Monday, Mr. Velu said that in the first phase, the Railways would be providing "dedicated corridors" in the Mumbai-Delhi and Ludhiana-Kolkata routes at a cost of Rs.22,000 crore.

Special purpose vehicle

A special purpose vehicle would be formed for the purpose. Public-private sector participation would be introduced in the maintenance of the tracks. The corridors would be introduced in the Kolkata-Chennai, Mumbai-Chennai and Kolkata-Mumbai routes later in a phased manner to cover the Golden Quadrilateral routes.

The Minister said the Delhi-Agra train was being run at a speed of 150 km an hour. If the speed of other trains had to be increased to that level, it was necessary to have "dedicated corridors" for goods trains. At present, five passenger trains had to be stopped to allow a goods train to pass.

"We want to run the goods trains at a uniform speed of 100 km/hour, and this would be possible only if we have dedicated corridors," he said.

Besides, the corridors would also help reduce the cost of goods transport, ultimately enabling the companies to offer their goods at competitive prices in the global market, he noted.

Mr. Velu said that after working out the economic returns, the proposal for introduction of a new rail route from Tindivanam to Nagari in Andhra Pradesh had been submitted to the Planning Commission for its approval. "I have personally discussed the proposal with the Deputy Chairman of the Commission, Montek Singh Aluwalia," he said. When asked about the reasons for the slow progress of the work on gauge conversion of the Katpadi-Villupuram metre gauge track, he said Rs. 25 crore had already been spent.

Palar bridge

While the Palar railway bridge, forming part of the track, had been completed, one of the two spans of the rail flyover across the Chennai-Jolarpet broad gauge track near the Katpadi-Gudiyatham Road was pending. The Railways would allot Rs. 1 crore exclusively to expedite the work up to Tiruvannamalai early, so that trains could be operated up to Tiruvannamalai, he said.

The Minister said that the Railways had planned to take up electrification of 5,000 km of track during the 11th Plan period. Out of a total track length of 65,000 km throughout the country, only 27 per cent had been electrified so far.

But the electrification had been done on the main routes, covering 50 per cent of the passenger trains and 60 per cent of the goods trains, he added.

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