Railways, NBCC to redevelop 10 railway stations

Rail Land Development Authority today joined hands with National Building Construction Corporation for redevelopment of 10 railway stations across the country on global standards.
The Railways has embarked on an ambitious project to redevelop 403 stations with the participation of private players, public sector and foreign agencies.
The identified stations to be taken up initially by NBCC for redevelopment are Tirupati, Sarai Rohilla (Delhi), Nellore, Puducherry, Madgaon, Lucknow, Gomtinagar, Kota, Thane (New), and Ernakulam.
An MoU was signed between RLDA, an arm of the Railways for commercial exploitation of rail land, and NBCC, a PSU of urban development ministry for implementation of station redevelopment projects for the 10 identified stations.

Speaking on the occasion, Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu said that the Railways has taken up this programme of station redevelopment in a big way, adopting a multi-pronged strategy to accomplish the mammoth task.
"We have chosen PPP model and are roping in varied agencies to execute the project namely Railways' own PSUs, other Central government PSUs, foreign countries through government-to-government cooperation and state governments".

Urban development ministry, which had launched a mega project of developing 100 cities as smart cities, joined the Railways in redeveloping stations as smart stations.
Urban Development Minister Venkaiah Naidu said "It is a very good idea to develop smart stations along with the smart cities".

Once the stations are redeveloped, the passengers will get facilities of world standard.
NBCC has now been given 10 stations in first phase for redevelopment and more stations would be given to them in subsequent phases.
RLDA and NBCC shall form a Special Purpose Vehicle in the form of a joint venture company to execute the station redevelopment project. The JV shall redevelop the stations on a self-financing model.
Earlier in October 2016, an MoU was signed between the ministries of railways and urban development for integrated planning for redevelopment of railway stations in the cities included in the Smart Cities Mission and AMRUT schemes.