Mega block: Trains services in Western section affected

MUMBAI: Train services in the heavily-populated Western Railway section were on Saturday badly affected as the Railways undertook the third phase of a mammoth project to quadruple the number of tracks in order to facilitate a better travel.

As many as 25 per cent of all commuter trains especially on the Western section between Churchgate-Virar line were either cancelled or terminated at earlier stations like Goregaon and Malad.

Most Mumbaikars, however, refrained from traveling altogether as could be seen by the sparse crowd in trains and empty platforms.

"We are quadrupling the tracks between Borivali and Virar which witnesses' maximum amount of traffic so that in future we can run more number of trains in this sector depending on the number of rakes available," Assistant General Manager Vivek Sahai said.

"I agree that this will cause inconvenience to our passengers for a couple of days but in the long-run this will be very beneficial," Sahai said.

Sahai said, "So far no long-distance train has been affected and 50 per cent of them actually reached on time,"

"Certain trains are being run from Mumbai CST and others will originate at Vasai Road instead of Mumbai Central or Bandra," he said.

This will be the last mega block on this sector and all train services are likely to resume at 6 am on Monday morning after 55 hours of work on the tracks.

The entire quadruapling track work is costing Rs five crore and the deadline for completion of the project is June 30, Sahai added.