The only air-conditioned (AC) local running on the Western Railway is finally attracting patrons. Just as the October heat has kicked in, the recent figures of Western Railway shows that in the past 9 months, 30 lakh people have used it. This is a positive sign especially with second AC local supposed to join the fleet within a few weeks.
As per the latest figures collated by the WR authorities, from December 25 last year (when it was first introduced) till September 30; over 30 lakh people have travelled in the AC local. The railway officials believe that this is a good sign as more people are accepting this train despite its low passenger in each coach.
The railway officials here are struggling to convince their bosses in Delhi to approve more AC locals for Mumbai due to poor usage of AC local. "Most of the commuters are season ticket holders," said a WR official. The season ticket holders constitute of around 28 lakh while remaining are card ticket holders.
In these 9 months, the AC local has generated revenue of Rs 12.46 crore from ticket sales with an average daily earning of Rs 5.70 lakh. Sources said that there has been marginal increase in number of passengers travelling in single train from over 1100 commuters to the present 1300 commuters.
A regular train ferries 4500 commuters per train. Currently each service ferries over 15500 commuters while in a day 12 services operate. Once the second AC local comes in at least 24 services shall be operated in a day of the total 1365 services.
Meanwhile even the regular local trains on WR have seen a jump in number of daily commuters using them. In September there has been an increase of 19 lakh commuters travelling in local trains with an average increase of 60000 commuters per day. The railway officials claim that this increase is due to the ongoing metro rail work on road due to which there is bumper-to-bumper road traffic.
WELCOME CHANGE
As per figures collated by the WR authorities, from December 25, 2017, (when it was first introduced) till September 30, 2018, over 30 lakh people have travelled in the AC local
