Better slow-mo than sorry

Metro Railway has given its motormen the licence to go slow, shifting focus from speed to safety as old-age ailments begin to show.

“Earlier, a driver would need to give a written explanation if his train was late by two minutes. In the past two months, no such statement has been sought even for a delay of over five minutes,” said a motorman.

The Metro rakes, most of them more than 25 years old, have been suffering frequent breakdowns since last year, raising concern about the safety of the transport lifeline that ferries around 5 lakh commuters every day.

The latest incident occurred on Wednesday when a Garia Bazar (Kavi Nazrul)-bound train got stranded at Kudghat (Netaji) station for around two hours from 6.30pm following a compressor collapse.

According to motormen, the snag could have led to a mishap had the driver not slammed the brakes. With the incident holding up peak-hour services, most trains ran up to 45 minutes late on Wednesday evening.

“We don’t have enough rakes. Three out of the 18 rakes in the fleet are not in service and that has affected punctuality,” admitted a senior Metro Railway official.

An approximate four-minute gap between the estimated journey time and the actual time taken to cover the entire stretch is also being blamed for schedules going haywire during rush hour. “The Metro schedule has been drawn up calculating the running time of 40 minutes from Dum Dum to Garia Bazar. But it takes at least 44 minutes to cover the stretch during peak hours,” said a motorman.

The diminishing brake power of some of the old rakes is another reason for trains running behind schedule. A train’s scheduled stop at a station is not more than 15 seconds but malfunctioning doors add to the stoppage time.

When trains run late, the number of passengers in each rake also increases. “One train can carry 2,500 passengers at a time. But in the peak hours, it carries over 3,000 people. The ageing brakes, the defective doors and rush force us to be extra cautious. All this takes a toll on timings,” said a motorman.

Officials said new rakes were the only solution. The first two air-conditioned rakes of a proposed 13-strong fleet have arrived after missing two deadlines of September 2009 and 31 March, 2010, but haven’t been rolled out yet.


Sanjay Mandal, The Telegraph Metro