North Central Railways to close all unmanned level crossings by September 18

ALLAHABAD: Authorities of North Central Railways (NCR) have embarked on an ambitious mission of closing all the 79 unmanned level crossings, coming under its jurisdiction, by the end of September 2018.
The target for the financial year 2017-18 had been surpassed by closing 75 out of 154 UMLCs on the system of NCR against the target of 73. It has been decided that the remaining 79 UMLCs would be closed in the current financial year by September-2018.

At a meeting, held at NCR headquarters at Subedarganj, the GM appreciated that the target for the financial year 2017-18 had been surpassed by closing 75 out of 154 UMLCs. The GM, M C Chauhan, advised that trenches should be dug on the approach to close down UMLCs in order to ensure that road vehicles are not able to come on railway tracks at such locations. It was also decided that drivers of tower wagons of traction distribution department would be given intensive training to prevent any case of SPAD by them.

Regarding maintenance of track, the GM advised that maintenance of track in high summer temperatures should be done with due care in order to prevent its buckling. He further advised that staff at rolling in and rolling out examination points should be extra-vigilant so as to ensure that no defect in the under-gear of rolling stock are missed. GM further advised that proper analysis of all unusual incidents should be done so as to ensure that the proper causes behind all such incidents are identified.

A discussion, on the recent rolling down of Ahemdabad-Puri express in Titlagarh was also taken up. The GM advised that lessons learnt from the incident should be utilised and all care should be taken in order to prevent any such incident on NCR. He further advised that adoption of shortcuts should be assiduously avoided. He said that all departments are responsible for safety in train operations within their own purview and they have to draw up their respective action plans for ensuring safety within their own realm. He appreciated the concept of Gross Happiness Index (GHI), which has recently been implemented to assess the condition, service and facilities being provided to loco pilots/assistant loco pilots in running rooms of NCR.