Even as passengers via Kottayam are expected to save 10 minutes of commuting time after the doubling of the 16-km Ettumanur-Chingavanam track, there are demands that the Southern Railway take steps to double short stretches of the tracks leading from the Shoranur station to Thrissur and Palakkad.
This will be crucial for completing double tracks on the entire Thiruvananthapuram-Mangaluru rail corridor. “Railways are yet to take a call on doubling around a km of the tracks from the Shoranur station towards Thrissur and Palakkad. These two corridors hold up trains coming on the double tracks from Mangaluru, that proceed southwards of Shoranur,” says P. Krishnakumar, general secretary of the Thrissur Railway Passengers’ Association.
The two single-track stretches south of Shoranur can even affect the introduction of rail services from Kerala through the newly electrified Konkan rail corridor, he says.
Sources in the Palakkad Railway Division say a proposal in this regard is being studied. “This will in turn necessitate an electronic interlocking system, for which the Shoranur railway yard will have to be remodelled. It will require bridge connectivity over the Bharathapuzha river, while also considering the alignment of the 109-km Ernakulam-Shoranur third track that has been envisaged.”
Passenger associations have been demanding that Railways ensure doubling of the 69-km Ernakulam-Ambalappuzha track adhering to the March 2024 deadline. The three reaches on the corridor are Ernakulam-Kumbalam (7.7 km), Kumbalam-Thuravur (15.59 km), and Thuravur-Ambalappuzha (45.9 km).
Earlier this year, Hibi Eden, MP, petitioned Union Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnav demanding that the Railway Board sanction the ‘detailed estimates’ for the track doubling works on the Ernakulam-Ambalappuzha stretch, since it was a prerequisite to distribute compensation to landowners and take possession of their land.
“The completion by March 2024 of the track-doubling through Alappuzha will depend on the Railway Board sanctioning the detailed estimates, following which the State government will have to hand over the land required,” say sources in the Thiruvananthapuram Railway Division.
A high-ranking official says the Railway Board is expected to sanction the 69-km track doubling through Alappuzha in a few months. “The delay occurred after it froze the proposal earlier. It now needs to be revived. Similarly, the outcome of the survey for the third track in the Ernakulam-Shoranur corridor too will be sent to the board for sanction,” he says.
Kanyakumari line
The sources say they hope to complete the land acquisition for doubling the Thiruvananthapuram-Kanyakumari stretch this year itself, in order to commission the 86-km stretch by March 2024. Cutting and filling works and that of bridges are under way. Work is also under way to develop Nemon as a satellite station by March 2024, in order to decongest the Thiruvananthapuram Central station.
