Shri Anil Kumar Khandelwal, Member Infrastructure of the Railway Board, conducted a thorough inspection of the iconic Pamban Bridge to assess its safety and operational readiness. During the visit, a successful light engine trial run was executed, confirming the bridge’s structural integrity and reliability.
More Details:
The Railway Board, Member Infrastructure, Shri Anil Kumar Khandelwal is currently on a two-day visit to Southern Railway. He held an extensive review meeting with Shri Kaushal Kishore, Additional General Manager, and the Principal Heads of Departments at the Southern Railway Headquarters. He also conducted a thorough inspection of the iconic Pamban Bridge to assess its safety and operational readiness.
During Meeting:
- During the meeting, Shri Khandelwal discussed various operational aspects and proposed improvements.
- He particularly focused on the progress of infrastructural projects, station redevelopment under the Amrit Bharat Station Scheme, electrification projects, construction of Road Over Bridges (ROBs) and Road Under Bridges (RUBs), subways, road safety measures, and signal & telecom works, along with other key performance indicators.
- He emphasised the importance of completing these projects on time, minimising disruptions to passenger traffic.
- Following the review meeting, Shri Khandelwal proceeded on a window-trailing inspection of the Chennai Egmore – Villupuram section in a special train, with scheduled inspections of Tambaram, Chengalpattu, and Villupuram stations.
Pamban Bridge:
- The New Pamban Bridge is a 2,070-metre (6,790 ft) long vertical lift sea bridge that is being built parallel to the existing Pamban Bridge at Rameswaram in Tamil Nadu. This upcoming structure will be India’s first vertical lift sea bridge.
- The new bridge will have 100 spans across the sea, 99 of which will be 18.3 metres and one of which will be 72.5 metres. It will be 3 metres higher than the existing bridge.
- Substructure is being constructed for two Tracks to accommodate future doubling and superstructure is being provided for Single line.
- To facilitate movement of ships across the Railway bridge, the navigational span can be lifted up to a height of 17 metres using a fully automated Electro-mechanical system.
- The air draft (vertical clearance) in the lifted position of the navigational span will be equal to the vertical clearance available in the Road Bridge, which will facilitate movement of bigger ships seamlessly across the sea.
Present Status of Work:
- All Substructures consisting of 333 Nos. of Piles and 101 Nos. of Pile Caps have been completed.
- All 99 Approach Girders have been fabricated and 76 have been launched. Remaining 23 spans are being launched from Pamban end, following the movement of Lift Span.
- Lift Span has been fabricated and is being launched. Out of 428m, it has been launched for 200m.
- Track has been linked for 1.50 km from Mandapam End and trial movement of goods trains (BFR with OHE masts) has been done.
- Remaining length of 0.60 km of track will be laid along with launching of Approach Spans from Pamban End.
- All Electromechanical Equipment has been procured. Trial assembly and Trial run of the Electro mechanical equipment has been done and found to be functioning satisfactorily.
- Lifting Tower has been erected on the Mandapam end of Navigation channel and the same is under erection on Pamban end of the channel.
- Raising of the Platform level and improvement to the station has been completed at the adjacent Pamban Station.
- The Bridge will be completed before the end of 2024 and commissioned for rail traffic.
Source: Southern Railway – Press Release | Images Credit: Southern Railway
