Railway ministry has constituted a Mobility Directorate to address the problem of punctuality of trains.
The directorate is a multi-disciplinary body and will look into all the impediments in running trains on time. In its first phase of making trains punctual, the railway has decided to increase the speed of every train by five kilometres per hour. In addition, the ministry will introduce EMU and DMU trains for small distance and substitute existing passenger trains for small distance.
The directorate is headed by a high level officer who is assisted by four executive directors from related fields-engineering, electrical, traffic and signalling.“Since, speed is the most important issue in maintaining punctuality, we are addressing it on a priority basis. We have the capacity to run at better speed, but we can not because of certain constraints,” M Jamshed, member of Traffic Railway Board, told DH.
“If we remove these constraints, we would be able to run at better speed. Locomotives, coaches, track and signals, all have the capacity to run at better speed. We have to just remove the constraints to utilise the capacity,” he added. Congestion of track is the main constraint. Railway officials opine that Howrah-Delhi line is the most congested. Passengers for small distance make the problem more complex.
Jamshed said that most of the time, trains are delayed in Delhi itself or take too much time in and around Delhi.
He said that railways have found that in some areas, trains run at speed as low as 25-30 kmph. They can not reach on time at such a low speed.
Published 23 April 2016, 18:34 IST