Two special holiday trains on Kalka track from tomorrow

Bhanu P Lohumi

Tribune News Service

Shimla, December 13

The Railways will run two special holiday trains on the Kalka-Shimla heritage track from December 15 to January 15. The move aims at attracting tourists during Christmas and New Year.

A notification to operate train 52445/53446 and 52443 and 52444 from Kalka-Shimla-Kalka has been issued by the Divisional Commercial Manager, Northern Railways, Ambala cantonment, Vimal Kalra.

“Only 10 per cent tourists come to Shimla by train and the idea behind running two holiday trains is to attract more during Christmas and New Year as the tourist inflow increases during this period due to snowfall,” Station Superintendent Prince Sethi said.

The two holiday trains will have seven coaches each and luxury coaches will be added for the comfort of passengers. Bookings can be done online. At present, six normal trains, one joyride to Shoghi, run on this track.

Welcoming the move, president of the Tourism Industry Stakeholders Association MK Seth said the holiday trains and Vistadome coach would attract the tourists and facilitate them during snowfall when roads are closed.

The 96-km long Shimla-Kalka rail track has been laid in the tough hilly terrain with 103 tunnels (now 102 tunnels as tunnel number 46 collapsed four decades ago), 800 bridges, 919 curves along with negotiable gradient. The track which gains altitude of about 1,590 is a marvel of engineering. The British laid the first rail link to connect Shimla in 1903 and the Kalka-Shimla rail track was declared a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 2009.

New attractions

• The Railways introduced Vistadome (transparent) coach with a glass roof, giving 360 degrees scenic view of the track to travellers on December 11.
• The technical trial for increasing the speed of the train on the Shimla-Kalka narrow gauge track from 25 km/h to 35 km/h, reducing the journey time by 30 minutes to one hour, was conducted successfully.
• The 600-m ride from the railway station to Baba Bhalkhoo Museum will be another star attraction. The ride is expected to start within a month.