In an endeavour to ferry more passengers and goods to cater to the demands of economic growth, the number of trains have seen an increase over the years. More number of trains means more number of operating platforms. And for this, Yards must be remodelled and automated. Yard remodelling works were taken up at City Railway Station in Mysuru from June 7. While the outside world just knew that as many as 30 trains were either cancelled, rescheduled or diverted due to remodelling works, only a few people who have knowledge about the works understood what remodelling was and how much of precision work it entails. In this Weekend Star Supplement, we present a snapshot of the Railway Yard works where our correspondent walks on the iron tracks, meets the ground-level workers and engineers seeking information and sneaks into corridors of power where high-level decisions are taken.

By B.C. Thimmaiah

Pics. by M.N. Lakshminarayana Yadav

Mysuru Railway Yard Remodelling on war-footing

A Rail Yard is a complex series of rail tracks for storing, sorting, or loading and unloading railroad cars and locomotives. Rail Yards have many tracks in parallel for keeping rolling stock stored off the mainline so that they do not obstruct the flow of train traffic.

Once inside a train, travelling comfortably across Railway Stations, a traveller does not realise the complexities of rail travel, station maintenance and how trains are received and despatched from the stations keeping passenger safety and time in mind. It is a complex network maintained by a team of Railway Engineers, Signalling Officers and a host of technical, administrative and support staff.

The Mysuru Railway Yard or the Mysuru City Railway Station is now being remodelled to ease operational constraints and enhance safety. The work began on June 7 and is expected to complete by June 23. The entire Mysuru Division Railway team is racing against time to meet the deadline in a most efficient manner.

Star of Mysore had the opportunity of seeing the Yard remodelling works first-hand all along the tracks, its technical aspects, complexities, teams involved and other nitty-gritty. Here we present a photo feature and an informative write-up about the works so that our readers understand and appreciate the works that are aimed at enhancing passenger safety, connectivity and for a better user experience.

Electronic interlocking and large-scale Yard remodelling project

Train passengers often complain of train delays. Though the national transporter has increased the run time of many of its trains to make sure that the punctuality record is maintained, sometimes delay is caused due to various factors including  congested Railway Yards where there is no free movement of arriving and departing trains.

Apart from bottlenecks and constraints in train operations, detention of trains at outer signals or adjacent stations just before the station leads to the track being occupied for a “considerable” period for want of clear path. Not only that, trains which did not have a scheduled stoppage at adjacent stations were also detained due to want of path for the train to move further.

To prevent detention of trains at outer signals, Indian Railways takes up route relay interlocking and yard remodelling works. And such works were taken up at the Mysuru Railway Division from June 7 this year.

The Mysuru Yard remodelling work involved providing connectivity towards Chamarajanagar from platform number 5 and 6. At present, trains arriving on platform 5 and 6 cannot be routed to Chamarajanagar and only trains arriving on platform 1 to 4 can be extended to Chamarajanagar. Linking platform 5 and 6 to the Chamarajanagar line will facilitate extension of more trains up to Ashokapuram.

Similarly, the remodelling of yard at Bengaluru involves inserting additional crossover to facilitate simultaneous reception and despatch of trains in different directions. This will minimise the detention of incoming trains at the outer signal in Mysuru.

Sharp crossovers have been smoothened to ensure and enhance safety in train movement. These works also involved major modification to signalling design and application logic on which signalling system works. The works entail coordination of multiple agencies and will extend the full benefit of doubling between Mysuru and Bengaluru and gauge conversion of Mysuru-Chamarajanagar.

The remodelling works meant regulation of nearly 30 train services involving cancellation, partial cancellation and diversion between June 16 and 23 and Railway authorities ensured minimum inconvenience to the passengers. Free buses were arranged for reserved passengers to and from Pandavapura Station from where some of the trains were scheduled to depart.

Ground-level work, supervision

From June 7, it was 24/7 work for over 400 workers, 20 officers and 40 supervisors. According to Divisional Railway Manager Aparna Garg who spearheaded the remodelling works, Senior Divisional Engineer Biradar and Senior Divisional Signal and Telecommunication Engineer Srinivas there was an absolute coordination between Signal and Telecommunication Department, Engineering Department, Electrical Department, Operations Wing, Communications Department, Safety Wing and the Railway Protection Force for the mammoth task of remodelling.

The remodelling works were to be initiated in 2013 but was delayed due to various  reasons. As soon as I took over as the Divisional Railway Manager last April, I initiated the process and got budgetary allocation and approvals from the higher ups and my General Manager. Once the remodelling works are complete, all the six platforms will be interconnected and there will be a seamless movement of trains from Bengaluru, Hassan and Chamarajanagar sections,” says Aparna Garg.

Seamless entry and exit of trains

The Railway Division has got the clearance from the Commissioner of Railway Safety and has initiated the works as per norms and the standards of Indian Railways.

At present, the movement of trains were limited and we could not go for simultaneous receipt and despatch of trains from Bengaluru and Chamarajanagar sections due to track constraints in the Railway Yard. Now with remodelled yard, there will be no stoppage of any train at outer signals,” says Biradar.

Mysore Yard is a big one where there is a constant movement of trains. To facilitate this constant and safe movement of trains to different destinations, the Division has been inserting additional crossovers. This will facilitate simultaneous reception and despatch of trains.

“All this will be electronic and will be controlled and managed at the Reception and Despatch Room. Once the remodelling works is complete, we have to go in for manual operations for seven days. We have set up a couple of counters along the railway track where station masters will coordinate with the loco-pilot and direct them to take a particular route. Once the seven-day testing is complete, the entire system will be switched over to automatic where with a press of a button, the tracks will move facilitating the entry and exit of multiple train simultaneously,” Biradar added.

Wider modernisation scheme

The problem of trains getting late and delayed at outer signal for longer period is mainly due to the old Railway Yard. The remodelling project forms part of a wider modernisation scheme for the Indian Railways network. “This Electronic Interlocking involves routes adopting most Modern Signalling System with Centralised Operation controlling all signals, points and Track Circuits. As of now, we are operating 175 routes and after remodelling, we can simultaneously and flexibly operate 201 routes,” says Srinivas.

“Apart from Srinivas and Biradar, a host of other officers including Ramesh Chandra, Umesh, Divisional Operations Manager Satish and a host of supervisors, multiple agencies, ground level cadre and most importantly skilled labour were involved in such a massive work with stringent timelines and pin-to-pin coordination. We cannot take a risk here and afford to slip as passenger safety is paramount,” explains Aparna Garg. “With the remodelling, the electronic interlocking system has been upgraded to the highest standard followed by the Indian Railways. Also, the sharp curves have been flattened and tracks have been widened,” she adds.

Continuous 24/7 monitoring

The Reception and Despatch Section at the Railway Office is the nerve-centre of the remodelling work. Every piece of the work done at the ground level is reflected in the giant LED screens inside this section. 

Officers continuously monitor the works and communicate with the ground-level technical teams and supervisors. Once the ground team finishes upgrading a point, it is tested at the Section and immediate feedback is communicated either for rectification or for the ground staff to move to the next point.

Officers and ground staff told Star of Mysore that earlier, when a train used to enter or exit the station, travellers would hear “thud” “thud” sound when the tracks are changed. Now it will be a smooth and seamless ride, they reveal.

T-28 Points and Crossing Changing Machine

Remodelling of Mysore Station Yard includes many aspects, including easing tracks of the present criss-cross system, which will increase speed of trains. Apart from manual labour, the South Western Railway Mysore Division used T-28 Points and Crossing Changing Machine for the works.

T-28 machine helps in laying of pre-stressed concrete points and crossings sleepers in track, which are heavy for manual loading. Using T-28 machine, turnouts can be laid in no time when compared to the laborious manual work.

The machine is manufactured in Italy and is used for relaying of turnouts. It consists of the following: Self-propelled portal crane, motorised rail trolley, non-motorised rail trolley and a jib crane.