The Hindu : New Delhi News : N. Railway gearing up for Games 2010

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Wednesday, Apr 02, 2008
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N. Railway gearing up for Games 2010

Manisha Jha

Special shuttle services, better passenger facilities being planned

NEW DELHI: Delhiites interested in watching the grand opening and closing ceremonies of the Commonwealth Games at Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium here in 2010 will be able to evade road traffic and parking blues by simply walking across from the existing link railway stations near the stadium if all goes well as per Northern Railway.

With several infrastructure and development projects in the Capital riding on the wave of the Games, Northern Railway is not far behind in doing its bit. As part of its core plans for the Games, it would be implementing many significant projects including running of special shuttle services for ferrying passengers from nearby areas to the Lodi Colony, Sewa Nagar and Lajpat Nagar stations that fall in the vicinity of Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium.

Northern Railway spokesperson R. Saxena said: “People interested in visiting the stadium will have to park their car a good 5 to 6 km away from the stadium. However, this move will facilitate visitors to de-board from the shuttle service trains at the three stations located near the stadium and then walk across to the venue.”

These three stations that are part of Ring Railway in the Delhi area network will also be provided with better passenger facilities such as enhanced seating arrangements, additional water booths and better illumination so that visitors to the stadium find commuting from these stations to the venue more comfortable.

Apart from this plan, Northern Railway has decided to undertake creation of a “green belt” along certain sections of its railway tracks and along the Yamuna river. In order to provide a pleasing ambience along with addressing the needs of the environment, it has planted 1.5 lakh trees which will be in foliage by the Commonwealth Games. Of these, 80,000 have been planted on the Yamuna bed while 70,000 trees have been planted around various tracks.

Provisioning of sound barriers along the railway track facing the Commonwealth Games Village site is also on the anvil, according to Northern Railway. This is being planned in technical consultation with Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi.

Mr. Saxena said: “Since there is a lot of sound generated by trains passing over the railway track we are planning to build a 1.1 km long acoustic sound barrier along the track facing the Commonwealth Games Village complex between Tilak Bridge and the upcoming Anand Vihar railway station on the Delhi-Ghaziabad section of Northern Railway. The sound proofing measure is being done to cut down any disturbance to the athletes caused by running trains in that section.”

Considering the large number of international tourists expected to arrive in the Capital during the Games, Northern Railway also plans to run special trains to Agra and Jaipur which along with Delhi form part of the “Golden Triangle” route popular with tourists. The number of such trains would be decided as per the demand, said Mr. Saxena.

This aside, Northern Railway is also steaming ahead with its eagerly awaited new railway station at Anand Vihar. Extensive work is also being done to upgrade the existing New Delhi and Hazrat Nizamuddin railway stations.

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