Mumbai: As many as 930 suburban local trains and 72 mail express trains will be cancelled from Friday to Sunday as Central Railway will take up two massive infrastructure upgrades at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) and Thane.
The CR would be taking up a 36-hour block platform expansion and yard renovation work at CSMT. Similarly, it would also be taking up a 63-hour mega block at Thane Station to carry out expansion work at platform number 5 and 6. Appealing to the people to venture out only in case of emergency, Divisional Railway Manager of Central Railway, Rajnish Kumar Goyal also asked the establishments to call only the staff which is necessary during the time of the block.
"The block at CSMT will start after midnight on Saturday, June 1 and during this block, the local services from CSMT to Byculla on Main line and CSMT to Vadala Road on Harbour line would be completely cancelled," Goyal said while speaking to reporters on Wednesday.
"While the block at Thane would start after midnight on Friday. There will also be an impact on 72 long-distance trains," Goyal said and added that on Friday, 161 locals will be cancelled while seven locals will have short terminations.
"On Saturday, we will be cancelling 534 locals while 306 locals will face short terminations and 307 locals will face short originations. There will be 235 locals that would be cancelled on Sunday with 131 and 139 locals facing short terminations and short originations respectively," Goyal added.
CSMT is considered as the busiest railway terminus in the country. Nearly, 1,810 local trains ply on the main line and harbour line routes of Central Railway. More than 1,299 of them are operated to and from CSMT. Central Railway has currently undertaken the work to expand platform of Mail Express trains.
"Platforms 10 to 14 at CSMT are being expanded to run 24 coach trains and this work is in final stage. As the platform is being extended from about 305 to 382 meters, the carriages will also be extended and it subsequently will increase the passenger carrying capacity by 20 percent," the official said and concluded that the upgradation works include track work from route relay interlocking to electronic interlocking.
