Railways may revisit plan for double-decker trains in Mumbai

Shiv Kumar

Tribune News Service

Mumbai, October 25

The Railways may revisit a plan to ply double-decker trains on Mumbai’s suburban network nearly a decade after it was junked.

Railway officials say they have been asked to take a relook at plans to ply these trains on Mumbai’s suburban railway network by the Bombay High Court which is hearing a public interest litigation petition in the matter. At present, the railways run double-decker trains on long distance routes like Mumbai-Surat and Mumbai-Goa. These trains are air-conditioned and do not have general compartments where passengers are packed to capacity, say railway officials.

”We had conducted a feasibility study nearly ten years ago after which we gave up on the idea of running double-decker trains on the suburban network,” an official from the Western Railway said.

Among the reasons given for junking the idea was the short time for a ’local’ train to halt at stations. Trains on the suburban network halt for 15 to 30 seconds during which time commuters board and alight from them.

When the proposal was first mooted, railway engineers suggested some modifications like separate entry and exit points in the double-decker trains. However with little room for commuters to move within the jampacked train, the idea was straight away discarded as impractical.

Other suggestions included additional entry and exit points and multiple staircases to allow increased dispersal of passengers in a short-time.

”However, we found that such modifications would reduce the carrying capacity of a coach,” a railway official said. A double-decker train has 30 per cent more capacity than the regular train. However, such trains, he said, has never been tested on the suburban route where coaches are packed to capacity and commuters hang out of the doors.