Railways demanding 42 per cent more land

The Railways is now demanding 42 per cent more land for the dedicated rail freight corridor project.

Three years ago, Rail India Technical and Economic Services (RITES), the consultancy wing of the Railways, had prepared a preliminary project alignment design for the proposed corridor project.

According to the final project alignment design prepared by the Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Ltd (DFCCIL), the Railways need to acquire 12,500 hectares over 51 districts in seven states. Earlier, it was estimated that 8,833 hectares was needed for the poposed Eastern and Western freight corridor projects.

RITES had prepared its earlier design on the premise that the new track would run parallel to the existing ones and did not take into consideration the high traffic density, busy towns and forest areas through which the new line would pass.

We had to modify the project aligment design to minimise modifications to the existing railway installations and skirt busy towns, cities and forest areas, a senior DFCCIL official explained.

With these modifications, the area needed for the detour alignment has increased. Detour alignment refers to the area that is over one km from the existing track.

Of the 1,483-km Western freight corridor between Dadri and Jawaharlal Nehru Port, 588 km falls under the detour alignment, while in the case of the 1,256-km Eastern corridor between Khurja and Sonnagar, the detour alignment stands at 528 km.

The Railways has already prepared land acquisition plans for 2,200 km. The gazette notification for acquiring 1,077 km has already been issued. These areas mainly fall in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra.

according to Exim News Service, by the end of January 2009, the Railways will be able to acquire nearly 100 km near Kanpur. The remaining areas will be acquired during the next six months.

Source: Transportweekly