The
recent deaths of four passengers due to their fall from a running local has
attracted attention nationwide and evoked a justifiable outrage. Railways are
being blamed, as always. Railways, on the other hand, blame overcrowding. In
other words, nobody is responsible for such cruel loss of lives just the same
way as none has been held accountable for the deaths of eighteen pilgrims in a
stampede at the New Delhi Railway Station.
As a former Chief Safety Officer on Central Railway I can vouch that the
situation is far grimmer than what these four deaths indicate. There were an
average of 15-16 deaths every day on the Suburban Network, 9-10 on the Central
and 5-6 on the Western Railway in the years 2015-16 though things may have
improved of late. Most of the deaths
occur when people crossing railway tracks are hit by a train, or when they fall from running trains. Many of those, who fall, especially the
youngsters, are often killed during stunts like hanging out precariously or
trying to touch every signal post or every OHE mast as a game of challenge.
Cases of passengers falling between the train and the platform, a common cause
of deaths years ago, have been eliminated by raising the suburban platforms
uniformly to close the gap.
Air-Conditioned
EMUs for Suburban Services
Later, when I was the Principle Chief Mechanical Engineer at ICF/Perambur, we made
the first air-conditioned EMU for Western Railway suburban services. I believe
many more have been built and supplied after that. The air-conditioning
capacity had to be especially designed to take care of an average load of
300-400 passengers per coach as compared to a maximum of 75-80 per coach for
mainline trains. Besides, frequent opening and closing of doors too had to be
accounted for.
What
if we air-conditioned all EMUs?
Air-conditioning
cannot be retrofitted. It can only be built into new rakes. The first EMU that
the ICF supplied was not put into operation for several months since its fare
structure and timetable could not be decided. Finally, it was allowed to run
during off-peak hours on the “fast-line”, i.e. with minimum stoppages. An EMU
train, whether on fast or slow line, stops at a station for merely 15-20
seconds. Commuters of Mumbai have got used to this and quickly disembark and
new passengers board during this short stop. Stoppages are shorter than those
written in the timetable since that is the only way overloaded trains can make time
during run.
An
air-conditioned EMU, on the other hand, will need much longer dwell time at
platforms - doors must open, passengers disembark and board, doors must then
close. Many a times doors are obstructed due to the crowd and the train control
system has to repeatedly attempt closing them. Since the train control is
interlocked with the doors, it won’t permit the train to start unless all doors
are firmly closed. Time taken in this process is about 50-60 seconds. While
this may not seem long, over twenty stops it will add up to an additional 40x20
or 800 seconds, or 13-15 minutes. This may appear an acceptable delay in
view of safety, average speeds will drop and will hold-up even the non-AC
trains that follow the AC one on the same track. As a result the entire network will slow down and
throughput in terms of passengers-per-hour will drop drastically, especially
during peak hours.
A
Knee Jerk Reaction – Retrofit Automatic Doors on All Trains
The
initial order to retrofit automatic doors on existing trains has now been
moderated and only new builds are mandated to have automatic doors. An air-conditioned EMU is a totally different genre than a regular
non-AC one. It requires the train to have a Train Area Network, typically on
Ethernet, running along the entire length. Then each door must be linked to
this network, typically through serial port on a coach-level network segment.
The air-conditioning system, called the HVAC, too is connected to the same
train network, and so on. In this regard an AC EMUs in not much different than
a Vande Bharat Express. There is no way automatic doors can be retrofitted in
an existing rake that was not built with this feature. Yes, all of these can be
replaced, quickly or gradually, with air-conditioned rakes. New non-AC trains
may also be fitted with automatic doors. But then we must be ready to accept a
lower passenger throughput per hour in both cases - AC and non-AC. Automatic doors were attempted about two
decades ago on the orders of the Supreme Court but were found too cumbersome in realisation.
Why Bash the Indian Railways All the Time?
Railways
have been trying to meet the ever increasing demands on its network with longer,
faster, and more frequent train services. This accommodation cannot continue
endlessly. A 3-4 minute headway has already been achieved. Some armchair
consultants recommend reducing it to 2 minutes or even shorter. Little do they
realise that it takes about 4 minutes for a trainload of 4000 passengers to
disembark at the terminal stations and new passengers to board. No signal
system, or software optimisation can compress this time without risking
stampedes everyday.
It is
expected that the Mumbai’s new metro system being built will take some load off
the suburban railway, though not significantly. The Indian Railway suburban
service is the cheapest transportation system anywhere in the world. There will
always be enough patrons, rich, middle-class, and poor, to keep the 80-lakh-a-day
crowd largely unaffected. Besides, air-conditioned (or automatic door closing)
trains will still not address the deaths of careless people crossing tracks,
which continue unabated despite counselling and campaigns to educate them.
An Easy and Quick Solution - Why Not
Stagger Office Timings?
A real
and workable solution that can be quickly implemented lies in the court of the
State and Local Governments. Office, School, College and
shops-and-establishment hours need to be staggered along and across the city.
Enough data exists with the Railways and the State Government to make an
intelligent plan with minimal disruption to businesses and offices. This has
been discussed endlessly for decades but no workable and effective solution has yet been put into force.
Why
Not Run Longer Trains?
Railways have converted all 9-car trains to 12-car over the last few years. Some trains
even have 15-car formations, but they are constrained by absence of 15-car
platforms at most stations along the route. They, therefore, run with fewer
stops on the fast line and preferably during off-peak hours.
Can’t we
convert all platforms to accommodate 15-coach EMUs? Yes, we can. It, however,
involves a lot more than merely making the platforms longer by some masonry
work – loop lengths must be made longer, crossings, switches, and signals will
need to be shifted. All that can be done in a matter of 3-5 years provided we
get down to it.
The Central Exchequer has been generous with budget grants to
the Indian Railways but a lot of it is being spent on non-critical
infrastructure. I hope the tragic deaths of these commuters will be a wake-up
call to planners in the Rail Bhawan, who will do well to prioritise investments
and attention to essential infrastructure and safety rather than spit-and-polish.
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