VISAKHAPATNAM: Vande Bharat Express, the country’s fastest train, is likely to start from Vizag in the next month. The modern high speed rail would likely be run on the Vizag-Secunderabad line in the daytime on the lines of Janma Bhoomi express.
Vande Bharat express would go from Vizag to Secunderabad in eight hours as against the 12 to 14 hours of present express trains.
According to sources, only one rake would be available for the service. So, the railways would run the train from Vizag to Vijayawada initially, and later it would be extended to Secunderabad. It would be decided in by the first week of December.
Presently, only an 18km stretch from Visakhapatnam to Duvvada would be in East Coast Railway’s jurisdiction. Once the new zone commences operations, then the Vande Bharat would run in 500 km in the South Coast Railway zone’s jurisdiction, sources said.
It is recalled that Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced in the Union Budget of 2022 that 400 new-generation Vande Bharat Trains with better energy efficiency would be developed and manufactured during the next three years.
The Waltair Division Railway Manager Anup Kumar Satpaty said that the Vande Bharat Express would be on Vizag's tracks this year. The staff of the division has already gone under the necessary training to operate the train.
"The trials of the train would be conducted very soon. One or two days of trials are enough to examine the railway tracks to run the train. If the train were run to Vijayawada it would take four hours and the return journey would also be the same," he said.
Sources said that the Vande Bharat, a fully AC train, will have 16 coaches with a capacity of around 1128 seats. The new Vande Bharat trains can reach a speed of 0 to 100 kilometers per hour in just 52 seconds, with a top speed of up to 180 kilometers an hour. The trains weigh around 392 tonnes, 38 tonnes lighter than the previous versions.
The DRM said that they would get a clear picture of the destination based on the availability of rakes. Initially, railways would run from Vizag to Vijayawada and later extended to Secunderabad, he confirmed.
