New terminus in three years: Suresh Prabhu

Union railway minister Suresh Prabhu during the foundation stone laying ceremony at Railway Camp Office, Dadar (east). (Photo: Rajesh Jadhav)

Navi Mumbai will soon have its first independent railway terminus from where trains will also originate and terminate. The facility is believed to save residents of the satellite city the trouble of travelling all the way to other terminus stations like Lokmanya Tilak Terminus, CST and Dadar.

The impetus to the Rs 154-crore project proposal came from the fact that Central Railways (CR) has exhausted its maximum capacity in terms of the number of passenger trains it can run on all of its termini. Union railway minister Suresh Prabhu initiated the project by laying the foundation stone at Dadar on Monday.

Currently, only about 32 trains pass through Panvel outstation everyday. But with the proposed mega project, in addition to them, 18 trains can be docked in the terminus and dispatched as originating trains.

This terminus will have three platforms, each equipped to dispatch and receive passenger trains.

“I have no doubt that the work for the terminus will be finished within three years, which will shift a lot of our passenger services on the CR to Panvel,” said Mr Prabhu. Stressing on the completion of the project, he said, “We hope that it will be completed and be ready for commuters to use within the next three years.”

Senior official have said that the terminus will actually be a big step towards running more passenger trains in all directions. “The biggest increase will be seen in our Konkan route, Panvel being the gateway to Konkan. Until now people used to catch trains coming from the South and heading towards Goa or so. We will also be increasing the number of passenger trains towards South India. We already have an established route there, but we weren’t able to increase as much as we wanted due to lack of infrastructure,” said an official on the condition of anonymity.

With this terminus the CR is also trying to push for more trains towards northern India to cities like Delhi and Agra, “Once we have the terminus, we will have a little bit of leeway to attach extra coaches to trains that we can see are getting a high response or have a long waiting list. The minister has also launched alternate trains for commuters under the Vikalp scheme, so there will be several options available once the work is done,” the official said.