Railways to launch 3,000 new trains, increase passenger capacity to 1,000 crore in 5 years
THE Indian Railways plans to introduce an additional 3,000 new trains on its network in the next four to five years to accommodate the increasing number of passengers because of population growth, reported PTI.
Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said, “At present, the railways is carrying about 800 crore passengers annually. We have to increase the capacity to 1,000 crore in four to five years as the population is growing."
“For this, we need 3,000 extra trains which will make several trips to accommodate this increased number of passengers," Vaishnaw added.
There are 69,000 new coaches available with railways and its subsidiary is manufacturing about 5,000 new coaches every year, the report said citing sources.
The report said railways are likely to add 200 to 250 new trains every year and these are besides 400 to 450 Vande Bharat trains, which are going to be added in the coming years.
The minister further said his ministry is also working to improve the speed of trains and expand the rail network.
“It is important to minimise the time taken to accelerate and decelerate a long route train because, besides scheduled stoppages, it has to decrease its speed at several cautions and curves along the route," PTI quoted Vaishnaw as saying.
“If we take the Delhi-Kolkata route from Rajdhani Express, and if we improve the acceleration and deceleration time at curves, stations and cautions, we will save two hours and 20 minutes from the current total travel time," he said.
The Railway Minister said acceleration and deceleration of Vande Bharat trains are four times better than other mail and express trains and That's why it saves a lot of travel time.
Vaishnaw said it will take time to introduce Vande Bharat trains on all routes, hence the railways is working out an intermediate solution to improve the acceleration and deceleration of other trains by doubling it from the current practice.
“This is possible with a technology known as push-pull configuration mode. We are planning to introduce this push-pull configuration on all the coaches that are being manufactured now. Long-distance trains will be upgraded and significant travel time will be saved," he added.
