Carmelaram-Heelalige rail line doubled, to open next month

The 10.5-km railway line between Carmelaram and Heelalige in southeastern Bengaluru has been doubled and is likely to be commissioned in the first week of February, officials said.

It is part of the 48-km Baiyappanahalli-Hosur line, which Rail Infrastructure Development Company (Karnataka) Limited has been doubling at a cost of Rs 498.73 crore.

The Commission of Railway Safety (CRS) has been invited to inspect the Carmelaram-Heelalige line on January 30. If the CRS is satisfied with the works and gives the go-ahead, the line will be commissioned within the next two weeks, a K-RIDE official said.

Having a second railway track between Carmelaram and Heelalige will help speed up train movements between Bengaluru and Hosur. Trains that link Bengaluru with Kerala and Tamil Nadu won’t have to wait at Bellandur or Heelalige.

However, the Baiyappanahalli-Carmelaram and Heelalige-Hosur sections will take another year or more to complete. K-RIDE officials are targeting a March 2024 deadline.

K-RIDE had awarded the contract for the Baiyappanahalli-Hosur line in several packages. However, the work on the Baiyappanahalli-Carmelaram and Heelalige-Hosur sections was very slow.

Unhappy with the progress, K-RIDE has now floated a fresh tender for completing the work from Heelalige to Hosur at a cost of Rs 79.5 crore. The work includes earthwork in formation, blanketing, and the construction of minor bridges, road underbridges and foot overbridges. February 23, 2023, is the last date to apply. A separate tender will be called for the construction of major bridges.

The agency also invited bids for blanketing in railway formation and other works on the Baiyappanahalli-Carmelaram section. Earthwork in formation, blanketing, and construction of minor bridges, platforms, station buildings and foot overbridges at Bellandur Road and Huskur will also be carried out. The cost of both works is Rs 39.01 crore. February 20 is the last date to apply. The tender for constructing two major bridges was also finalised recently.

Rail enthusiast Sanjeev Dyamannavar urged the authorities to expedite work on the other sections of the line. "The full benefits of the project will come only when the entire line is doubled,” he said.

He also asked the railways to maintain train timings from and towards Hosur, eliminate level crossings and introduce automatic signalling between Yeshwantpur and Hosur.

New station buildings & platforms

Under the Baiyappanahalli-Hosur doubling project, some of the small but important railway stations located in Bengaluru's tech hub are getting a facelift.

While Bellandur Road, Heelalige and Anekal Road will get new station buildings, a new halt station will be built at Huskur. Work on the Heelalige railway station building is 90% complete, and the same contractor will construct a new station building at Anekal Road. A separate tender has been called for new station buildings at Bellandur Road and Anekal Road stations.

Bellandur has one platform and will get a second. Work on building another platform at Heelalige has been completed. The new station at Huskur will also have a platform. Carmelaram won't get any new platforms.

"All these stations, existing platforms will be dismantled and new ones built. They will also be 600 metres long. Carmelaram will get longer platforms in the second phase.

Yeshwantpur-Channasandra

The doubling of the 21.7-km Yeshwantpur-Channasandra railway line at a cost of Rs 314.1 crore has been going on at a snail's pace. K-RIDE had to call another tender to finish the remaining work.

A K-RIDE official said the tender had been finalised and a Letter of Acceptance would be issued soon.