New carriages on track in mid October
Sri Lanka Railway has decided to put the newly imported railway carriages on track from mid October. The carriages are now in test runs, said a senior official of the Railway Department.
The 25 new carriages are a part of the 100 carriages ordered from China. They cannot be linked to all kinds of locomotives since they use air brake, said the sources. The rest of the order is to arrive in Sri Lanka before the end of the year.
The Railway intends to put the new carriages in intercity and long distance trains. The government has also ordered 15 locomotive engines from China and they are to arrive in the country mid next year.
Sri Lanka Railway that caters to around 300,000 commuters a day is running at a loss of around Rs. 7.5 billion per annum. It is in short of carriages and commuters of Kelani Valley line recently blocked trains to protest the department for not providing sufficient carriages for office trains.
Source: Colombo Page
Tags: carriages, china, commuters, locomotive engines, long distance, stainless steel, trains
