Jammu-Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Rail Link (JUSBRL) Project

[PlaneMad]

would this be the only section on IR with snow?

[sgups]

^ kalka-shimla would also be snow-affected.

[SarafIndian]

Sometimes in Darjeeling Himalayan Railway too. But the amount of snow falls is not comparable with Kashmir.

[Abhay]

Turnout at the first phase of Kashmir polls has been huge. Could it be that the train has done something to cool down sentiments?? BBC reports that even a former militant has decided to contest elections and shun the bullet for the ballot.

[skganji]

Originally Posted by Abhay

Turnout at the first phase of Kashmir polls has been huge. Could it be that the train has done something to cool down sentiments?? BBC reports that even a former militant has decided to contest elections and shun the bullet for the ballot.

It could be the railways effect and may also be Obama's effect.

[antriksh_sfo]

Originally Posted by skganji

It could be the railways effect and may also be Obama's effect.

Hey Guys,
Pls update us with the present situation.
Away from India, we have no details about the progress.
Let us keep this thread running.
It is prideful posession.

[Euromast]

Kashmir gets rail link, international flights

Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir will get a twin boost from United Progressive Alliance Chairperson and Congress President Sonia Gandhi when she inaugurates a crucial Kashmir rail link on Saturday.


The Kashmir rail link will cover 100 kilometre from Anantnag to Baramullah, criss-crossing five districts and is the world's second highest train project.


"We have connected the train to the last point that is Baramulla. Although nothing is decided yet, we can even go up to Kupwara or even Uri," said Virender Kumar, Deputy Divisional Engineer, Northern Railways.


Officials say the Kashmir train is expected to link with the rest of the country by 2015 but train within Kashmir is now a reality with another 32 kilometre added to the Baramulla-Qazigund edition.


It will link the last 20 kilometre to Qazigund by June but the 148 kilometre of difficult stretch from Katra to Qazigund continues to pose a challenge for the Rs 11,000-crore project

vedio

[skganji]

The biggest hurdle in completing the project is the remaining portion of the Katra-Qazigund link. Currently the work is supsended on this stretch and they have appointed experts to study an alternative alignment.

"Railways have roped in an Austrian expert to suggest a new alignment for the Katra-Qazigund section of the Kashmir rail project where work has been suspended for nearly six months due to problems in working out a way in the treacherous terrain.

Austrian expert John Golser has been included in the seven-member committee headed by former Railway Board Chairman M Ravindra to suggest a new alignment in the 70 km Katra-Qazigund section.

Beside the expert committee, Rolf Stadelmann of Amberg Engineering, Switzerland has also been hired as a consultant to conduct an independent survey of the proposed alignment.

The earlier survey of the Rs 6,800 crore project was found to be inadequate. Work could not progress due to repeated collapse of tunnels while cutting the mountains for the rail route.

"The existing alignment was causing so much problem that we decided to stop the work to avoid wastage of money and resources on the project," said a senior Railway Ministry official.

The stretch between Katra and Dharam in the Katra-Qazigund segment has the most difficult terrain consisting of steep slopes intersected by a number of rivers. Besides geological challenges, climatic conditions are also harsh in the area.

The expert team is examining the area between Katra and Dharam to suggest an alternative alignment, said the official, adding the committee has been told to submit the report by the month end."

Source : etalaat.com

[jstarra49]

Originally Posted by skganji

The stretch between Katra and Dharam in the Katra-Qazigund segment has the most difficult terrain consisting of steep slopes intersected by a number of rivers. Besides geological challenges, climatic conditions are also harsh in the area.

The expert team is examining the area between Katra and Dharam to suggest an alternative alignment, said the official, adding the committee has been told to submit the report by the month end."

Where exactly is Dharam? Could someone possibly point it out on Google Maps? I can find Katra and also can see the rail alignment upto Katra on Google Maps.

Is it then the case that work continues unabated from Dharam to Quazigund, which presumably includes the tunnel between Banihal and Quazigund?

Thanks.

[Bombay2Calcutta]

Chug to Kashmir through India’s longest tunnel
MUZAFFAR RAINA

Source : The Telegraph
http://www.telegraphindia.com/109090...y_11460483.jsp

A train comes out of the Wushaoling tunnel in China
Srinagar, Sept. 6: Jammu and Kashmir is bracing for a rare feat: the opening of the country’s longest railway tunnel that will realise the century-old dream of connecting the Valley with the rest of India by train.

Eight kilometres of the 11km tunnel have been completed, and it is set to be opened for traffic by December next year. The tunnel will run from Qazigund in the Valley to Banihal in Jammu, boring through the mighty Pir Panjal mountains.

It will be Asia’s second-largest tunnel, behind only the 20km Wushaoling tunnel in Gansu, northwest China, easily beating India’s current longest, the 6.5km Karbude tunnel of the Konkan Railway.

“This is surely an engineering marvel,” said Colonel Parminder Singh, assistant general manager of Ircon, the railway ministry arm constructing the tunnel. “We have completed 4.5km from the Banihal side and 3.5km from the Qazigund side. We are now in the last stage of the project.”

The Rs 647-crore project will cap another milestone by the railways — the 119km stretch from Baramulla in north Kashmir to Qazigund in south Kashmir, which became operational a few months ago.

However, a Valley resident who catches a train from Baramulla or Srinagar and arrives in Banihal will then have to ride a bus or car to Udhampur before he can take a train again to travel deeper into India. The railway stretch from Banihal to Udhampur is yet to be completed.

Work on the tunnel began six years ago simultaneously with the Qazigund-Baramulla stretch after then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee announced a 292km rail link between Baramulla and Udhampur, connecting the Valley with the rest of country, a project conceived more than 100 years ago.

When completed, it would be a viable alternative to the 300km Jammu-Srinagar highway, on which travel is risky but which is now the only surface link between Kashmir and the rest of India.


The Rs 11,000-crore rail link is divided into three sections — Udhampur-Katra, Katra-Qazigund and Qazigund-Baramulla. The third stretch alone stands completed and is operational.

The remaining two sections pass through difficult terrain and will have numerous tunnels and bridges, including the world’s highest bridge, 359 metres high and 1.3km long, over the river Chenab.

Only when these two sections are complete will the dream of a long-distance train chugging into the Valley from mainland India be realised. Work on the Katra-Qazigund stretch, however, was stopped last year after some experts raised doubts about the track alignment.

But work on the Qazigund-Banihal tunnel has continued uninterrupted, and care is being taken to provide it with modern drainage, fire-fighting and ventilation facilities. The tunnel has a three-metre-wide road running parallel to the tracks to deal with emergencies.

Construction is being done following the Austrian tunnelling method, first used in India for the Delhi Metro. The method involves the integration of surrounding soil formations into a ring-like support structure.

[jstarra49]

So I suppose the writer of this article does not consider Japan to be part of Asia then? Since if he did, he might have noticed that Sei-ken at 53.85km and Iwate-ichinohe at 25.81km and Dai-shimizu at 22.22km are all railway tunnels that are longer than the Wushaoling at 21.05km. It turns out that there are another 14 or so railway tunnels in China, Japan, Taiwan and Asian Russia that are longer than 11km. Oh well, newspaper article writers are not known for being very thorough in their research.

[Naresh]

.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh postpones visit to Kashmir for opening railway line

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has postponed by over a week his planned visit to Kashmir, during which he will inaugurate a 12-km railway line connecting Anantnag and Qazigund that will mark the completion of the rail project in the valley.

The Prime Minister was scheduled to visit the state on October 18 but it had to be postponed because of the non-availability of railway minister Mamata Banerjee, official sources said.

Singh, who is expected to tour the state for two days, is now likely to be there on October 27. During his visit, he is expected to review the railway project connecting the Kashmir valley with Jammu region, the sources said.

He may also review the Dal project besides progress in other developmental schemes under the Prime Minister's Reconstruction Plan.

The Prime Minister had inaugurated the 66-km long section from Anantnag to Mazhom last year. Congress president Sonia Gandhi had earlier this year inaugurated the 35-km-long Mazhom-Baramulla line, part of the 119-Km Qazigund-Baramulla railway line.

An amount of Rs 2,551 crore has been incurred on the Qazigund-Baramulla railway link till end of December last year.

Singh, who was also present at the inauguration early this year, had said the line was bound to catalyse economic growth in the Kashmir valley with the availability of cheaper and more reliable transport.

Cheers

[kronik]

Thanks for the update. Hadn't heard about it for a while now.

although there is an unfortunate news of a derailment earlier this month on the track though. Nobody was hurt.

[satsk3]

Video: Times of India

News: -


After nine years of wait another crucial part of the Kashmir train line - between Qazigund and Baramullah - is complete, connecting South Kashmir to its north. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is on a two-day visit to the state, today inaugurated the crucial rail link.

This is now the fastest way to travel across the Kashmir Valley: Two hours as against the four hour travel by road.

"This will connect us to every state. It will bring profits. If sending goods in trucks costs Rs 10,000, on a train it will cost just Rs 2,000," said Ali Muhammad, a Qazigund resident.

The line is complete, but the project is not.

Now Baramulla and Qazigund are connected at one end and Katra and Jammu on the other. But the most crucial part - 70 kilometres in between connecting Qazigund to Katra - is underway. It's a route that passes through the steep Pir Panjal Mountains.

The project is an engineering marvel of sorts.

Once built, the 290 kilometre track will boast of 750 rail bridges and hundreds of kilometres of tunnels.

The longest tunnel is 11 kilometres, the highest rail bridge is at 359 metres, and the longest bridge will be 1,315 metres long across Chenab River.

At one point in the Pir Panjal Mountains the track is built at 11,000 feet. The project deadline is 2017.

"The whole area is mountainous and there are a number of tunnels. This area has deep gorges, rivers like Chenab and Alji, and bridges that are very high," said Hari Shankar Yadav, the chief engineer.

Travelling in this train is a dream come true for every Kashmiri. It will run from South to North Kashmir connecting the entire Kashmir valley. Now the big question is how much time will it take to get connected with the rest of the Indian Railway network.

Source : NDTV (Video Available)

[sidney_jec]

great news
better connectivity will help Kashmiris to be a part of the mainstream, job creation and a lot more..
may be this would help solve the problems to some extent..
just a little step but a significant one IMO..

[antriksh_sfo]

Great News.
Congratulations everyone.

Imagine the cost saving, prosperity, pollution reduction, inclusive development that would come up once the whole line is complete.
Hope the line is completed in 2012/2013 rather than 2017.

I had been in Kashmir and had taken with me my parents, that was an awesome experience. I loved that. It has been long wait we want inclusion of all people into the Mainstream.

All the best. Can someone post few pix also.

[Illusionist]

about time kashmir got a better way of transportation..
way to go IR.

[Bombay2Calcutta]

[Bombay2Calcutta]

Tracking Jammu and Kashmir's rail history

When Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Wednesday flagged off a train bedecked with flowers on the 18-km stretch between Qazigund and Anantnag in the Kashmir Valley, he actualised a dream that Jammu and Kashmir's Dogra rulers had seen more than a century ago.

Maharaja Pratap Singh first explored the possibility of a railway line connecting Jammu with Srinagar in 1898 but the idea was put on hold because of complications involved in laying the track over a hilly terrain.


However, in 1905, the maharaja approved a railway line between Jammu and Srinagar via Reasi through the historic Mughal Road. Involving a 763 mm gauge railway climbing through the Mughal Road at 11,000 feet on the Pir Panjal Range, this would have been a spectacular low gauge. But an elevated pass would have meant it was not all weather which made it impractical.


With partition in 1947, the state was disconnected from the Indian rail grid and a new line from Pathankot to Jammu had to be laid.


Manmohan Singh Wednesday became the sixth Indian prime minister - after Indira Gandhi, her son Rajiv Gandhi, I.K. Gujral, Deve Gowda and Atal Bihari Vajpayee - to inaugurate railway projects and trains in Jammu and Kashmir.


In 1983, Indira Gandhi laid the foundation for the 54-km Jammu-Udhampur stretch. The railways later promised that a rail link would be extended by 290 km to Baramulla in the Kashmir Valley. But nothing was done till 1996, when then prime minister P.V. Narasimha Rao sanctioned Rs.2,600 crore for the extension of the rail link from Udhampur to Baramulla, covering 290 km.


After that, there was no headway in the project for many years. But then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee declared it as a national project in 2003.


The project has been divided into three parts - 41 km long Udhampur to Katra, 130 km long Katra to Qazigund and the 119 km Qazigund to Baramulla, which was thrown open Wednesday.


The 66 km section of Qazigund-Baramulla - from Anantnag to Mazhama - was inaugurated by Manmohan Singh in October last year, Sonia Gandhi later did the honours of inaugurating the 35 km section from Mazhom to Baramulla earlier this year.


But the railway link from Udhampur to Qazigund- that will connect Kashmir with the rest of India - remains incomplete, which is said to be the most difficult project in the subcontinent.


The terrain passes through the Himalayas. The alignment presents one of the greatest engineering challenges. What makes the route even more complex is a pass through the Himalayan foothills and the Pir Panjal range, with most peaks exceeding 15,000 feet in height.

[shanware]

....fantastic news !

Originally Posted by Bombay2Calcutta