LAHORE: Pakistan Railways is planning to start an intercity shuttle train service among major cities with the cooperation of the Punjab government.
PR sources told APP here on Sunday that Lahore- Gujranwala, Lahore-Faisalabad, Lahore-Narowal-Sialkot and Lahore-Okara sections were under consideration for the service under the direction of PR Minister Khawaja Saad Rafique.
As soon as study on the routes is completed, work on the projects will start, they added. Pakistan Railways is also drawing an outline for transportation of 12 million ton coal for future power generation projects to be constructed at Jamshoro, Qadirabad, Sahiwal, Sundar and Faisalabad with the cooperation of China to overcome the energy crisis.
The PR will also provide coal transport vans to the private sector for power generation plants to be set up by the private sector. Under a plan to revive the department, the PR is in dialogue with the Chinese government to upgrade ML- 1 (main-line one) which connects Karachi via Rohri, Khanewal, Lahore, Lalamusa and Rawalpindi. It is expected that PC-1 of the project would be completed till the end of the current year at the expenditure of China. After the restoration of ML-1, it will be possible to operate trains at 120 km/hour instead of a restricted speed limit.
A dry port is being planned at Havelian for holding containers with the cooperation of the Chinese government and about 2 million ton goods per year could be handled from Khunjrab to Havelian as a pilot project.
The PR is planing to lay a new track to connect Gawadar and Karachi as well as ML-2 track from Gwadar to Dera Ghazi Khan via Khuzdar, Baseema and Jacobabad is also under consideration. The Chinese government will complete its study on the tracks till December 2015 and it would bear all expenditures.
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