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If you were thinking of whipping down from Chennai to Ernakulam and back in 15-16 hours in the near future, forget it. The Railway Ministry is yet to complete even the pre-feasibility studies for running high speed trains.
The cost and mode of financing these projects will be known only after the studies are completed.
Tenders for pre-feasibility studies of all the proposed six corridors have been invited; and studies are at various stages, stated the Minister of State for Railways, Mr K. H. Muniyappa, in written reply to a question in Lok Sabha today.
The Railway Ministry has decided that the pre-feasibility studies for running high speed passenger trains will be on a 50:50 cost sharing basis with the State Governments concerned.
The corridors for which pre-feasibility studies will be conducted and the State Governments concerned are: Delhi-Chandigarh-Amritsar (State Governments of Delhi, Chandigarh, Haryana, Punjab); Pune-Mumbai-Ahmedabad (Maharashtra and Gujarat); Hyderabad-Dornakal-Vijaywada-Chennai (Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu); Chennai-Bangalore-Coimbatore-Ernakulam (Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Kerala); Howrah-Haldia (West Bengal); and Delhi-Agra-Lucknow-Varanasi-Patna (Delhi, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar).
On the Railways' earlier decision to set up National High Speed Rail Authority for planning, standard setting, implementing and monitoring of High Speed Rail projects, a consultant has been appointed to advise the Ministry.
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