Coimbatore-Patel Nagar weekly cargo express train flagged off

COIMBATORE: An exclusive parcel cargo express train chugged out of Coimbatore North Station on Saturday morning. The 15-coach train will reach Patel Nagar in Delhi on Monday night.
It will leave Patel Nagar on Wednesday and reach Coimbatore on Friday.
The express train is scheduled to depart from Coimbatore every Saturday. It will stop at Tirupur, Erode, Salem, Renigunta and Nagpur.
Parcel cargo express trains, designed to carry ‘finished goods,’ have more width compared to goods trains. They travel at a higher speed.
The train was flagged off by Salem divisional railway manager Subba Rao, additional divisional railway manager A Annadurai and senior divisional commercial manager E Harikrishnan.
This weekly train has been leased to a private transport company through a tender based on a six-year contract. It can carry 353 tonne and each coach carries 23 tonne plus eight tonne in the guard coach. For every journey, the railway is expected to earn Rs 26.8 lakh.
In a bid to promote this parcel cargo express trains, the division floated tenders for parcel cargo trains from Coimbatore to three destinations—Patel Nagar, Rajkot, Jaipur -- and from Vanjipalayam to Guwahati.
Additional divisional railway manager A Annadurai said, “A single company has taken the tender to operate it to Patel Nagar and Rajkot. The trains to Rajkot will begin in another two weeks. his year, we sent 194 parcel cargo coaches from Salem division between April and July. For the same period last year, we sent hardly 59.”
A railway department official said they plan to promote Coimbatore North as a primary freight station.
“We also want the manufacturing units in Coimbatore to make use of this new service. We can even schedule train services for all seven days in a week. We are speaking to industrial associations in the city to promote this new service,” the official added.
The official clarified that the train would not transport raw materials like cement, rice and gunny bags.