The Ambala unit of the Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Limited (DFCCIL) has successfully conducted its first trial on the Shambhu-Sahnewal section of the freight corridor in Punjab.
Unit chief general manager(CGM) Pankaj Gupta on Tuesday said that a successful trial of an electric loco goods train was conducted on the track after receiving authorization from higher authorities.
The trial was conducted for two hours from 1.45 pm to 3.45 pm at an average speed of 50-60 km that touched a maximum speed of 70 kmph,” he added.
With the successful completion of the trial, the officials are hopeful that full-fledged freight traffic will likely open on the section by July-end or early August.
“After completion of construction, we have now conducted a trial run and will be handed over to the railways. In the first week of July, four senior officials of the Northern Railway will conduct a safety inspection before final commissioning,” Gupta said
Part of the total 175.1-km section from Sahnewal in Punjab to Pilkhani in Uttar Pradesh of the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor, the 82-km long track starts near the Haryana-Punjab border in Patiala and ends at Sahnewal in Ludhiana.
There are a total of 14 new stations allowing crossings, out of which six – New Shambhu, New Sarai Banjara, New Mandi Gobindgarh, New Sirhind, New Khanna, and New Chawapail – are on the section where the run was conducted.
The eastern corridor will separate freight traffic from passenger trains and will cover Ludhiana, Fatehgarh Sahib, Patiala, Ambala, Yamunanagar, and Saharanpur districts in three states.
The construction of the corridor is being done in three phases, Shambhu-Sahnewal in Punjab (82 km), the Kalanaur-Pilkhani part in Uttar Pradesh (16.8 km), and Shambhu-Kalanaur in Haryana (76.7 km).
The section in Uttar Pradesh is going to be completed soon, and the trial run might be conducted by the end of this month and on the Haryana section by August 15.
A severe delay was experienced at the project in Haryana, primarily because the corridor was passing through the military area in Ambala Cantonment and a CSD canteen was demolished to allow passage of tracks.
As per the authorities, the creation of rail infrastructure on such a large scale, will give a boost to the industries and drive the establishment of logistic parks along its alignment.
