Railways gearing up to keep traffic on tracks in monsoon

Railway authorities are gearing up to keep the traffic on tracks and up running during the monsoon, which is likely to hit the Maharashtra coast early June.
The preparations include cleaning of culverts, desilting of side drains, installations of pumps, special maintenance of infrastructure etc, Western Railway said in a release here.
Stating that these works will be completed by the month in the first phase, the release said that "WR has also identified the flood prone areas on its section and on the basis of this analysis, more attention will be paid to certain sections which could be flood prone".

It has also come up with a time table showing the dates of high tides of more than 4.5 meters during monsoon, which will help in taking necessary precautions when required most.
On the other hand, Central Railway, in a separate release said 20 pumps will be in readiness along the CST-Thane section (11 pumps); Thane-Kalyan section (3 pumps) and CST-Mankhurd section (6 pumps) to deal with the flooding problem during the monsoon.
Besides, the Central Railway has desilted and cleaned 48,500 meter of drains on CST-Kanjurmarg section and 37,660 meter of drains on Kalyan-Kanjurmarg section as part of the monsoon prepaprtion plans.

In addition, CR has cleaned the culverts with 30 on the CST-Kanjurmarg section, 13 on Kanjurmarg-Thakurli section and 29 on CST-Mankhurd section, according to the release.
More importantly, in order to give uninterrupted signalling, Multi Section Digital Axle Counters have been provided at Byculla, Parel, Sion, Ghatkopar, Bhandup, Vikhroli, Kanjurmarg, Mulund, Thane, Kalva, Mumbra, Kalyan on main line and Chunabhatti on harbour line, the release said. Also, sealing of signals and AWS magnets have been completed to prevent rain water entering, the CR said.