Infrastructure (Railways)

Pakistan Railway comprises 8,775 route km, 781 stations and 42 trains halts. It has a fleet of 546 diesel electric locomotives, 25,815 wagons and 2,099 passenger coaches. Maintenance is provided by three major locomotive workshops and thirty-five smaller workshops. Signaling facilities at important stations are track circulated within interlocking limits. Most routes have VHF radio coverage for communication between train dispatchers and trains. Telephone Communication is over wire lines and microwave. Freight traffic during the past five years has averaged 5-6 million tones per annum. It was 15 million tones per annum in the 1960 but trucking has steadily taken over the freight market. The volume of freight traffic in 1995/96 was approximately 5.1 billion-km. PR carried about 145 million passengers per annum in the 1970 but during the past five years, it has dropped to 70 million per annum.

However the average distance per kilometre has increased from 80 km in the 70's to about 260 km today. Competition from the inter-city bus services is increasing and only an efficient rail service will be able to increase its clientele. Pakistan Railways is multi system and operates on three gauges, i.e. broad gauge, meter-gauge and narrow gauge. The gauge wise route length and track length of Pakistan Railways on 30th June, 1996 were as under:

*Include 374 km of broad-gauge section closed w.e.f. 1-7-1991

** All 611.10 km of Narrow-gauge section have been closed w.e.f. 1--1991

Currently Pakistan Railways functions under the guidance of Ministry of Railways. The Railway Board comprises the Chairman and four Members. The Chairman of the Board is ex-officio Secretary to the Government of Pakistan. The four member of the board, namely Member Traffic, Member Mechanical Engineering, Member Civil Engineering and Member Finance are ex-officio Additional Secretary to the Government of Pakistan. The Railway Board functions as a policy, planning and review Board. In order to make Pakistan Railways a more efficient and viable organization by following business led approach, a setup of Pakistan Railways has been developed and wide powers are vested in the Board of effectively supervise the running of the six functional units as follows:

a. Railways Operational Units.
b. Production Unit-I (Carriage factory/Islamabad, Automatic Vehicle Launching Bride Section, Steel Shops etc).
c. Production Unit-II (Locomotive Factory, Risalpur, Locomotive Rehabilitation Project).
d. Production Unit-III (Concrete Sleeper Factories, Flash butt Welding Plant, Sukkur, etc.)
e. RAILCOP (Railway Construction Company, Pakistan Ltd.)
f. PRACS (Pakistan Railway Advisory and Constancy Services Ltd.)

The General Manager heads the Railway Operation unit. The remaining five units are headed by the Managing Directors who have full autonomy for the running of their respective units. All Functional units are accountable to the Railway Board.

A Task Force on Pakistan Railways was constituted by the Prime Minister in March 1997, and was required to make specific recommendations for the restructuring and reform of railways for the balanced and consistent development of the railroad sector. The Task Force submitted recommendations in April 1997.

Modernization Activities

The major emphasis of Pakistan Railways has been on the replacement of overage assets. Due to resource constraint, however, it is now engaged in modernizing certain areas as best as it can. These include the following:-

i. To ensure more comfortable journey it has been decided to manufacture only lower class air-conditioned coaches in future.
ii. All second class coaches are being provided with cushioned seats.
iii. Reservation work has been computerized on modern lines at Lahore and Karachi stations; the system's two major reservation centres. Computerization of reservation offices of Peshawar, Rawalpindi, Faisalabad, Multan and Hyderabad is in progress and is likely to be commissioned shortly. The steps are now underway to link these stations with other major railway stations.
iv. Closed circuit televisions have been introduced at Lahore, Karachi, Multan and Faisalabad railway stations. This entertainment is being extended to Sukkur, Rawalpindi and Peshawar stations in the next phase. Subak Kharam and Shalimar trains have also been provided with closed circuit televisions and this system is being provided in Subak Raftar also.
v. Public address system is being provided in Subak Raftar, Subak Kharam, Tezgam and Khyber Mail trains.
vi. Modernization of Karachi, Quetta, Hyderabad, Multan, Lahore, Faisalabad, Rawalpindi and Peshawar Railway stations, removal of hindrances on railway platforms and upgradation of approach roads are being carried out.
vii. Private Sector is being encouraged to participate in the activities of the system. As a first step, ticket selling and ticket checking on Lahore-Faisalabad and Lahore-Narowal-Sialkot Sections have been privatized.
(viii) Feasibility study for a high-speed track is in hand.

Development Schemes

The Pakistan Railways has proposed major replacement and rehabilitation schemes for the forthcoming five year plan.

An amount of Rs. 40 billion has been allocated for ongoing and new works. The major physical components which would be completed during the Plan period includes:

i. Doubling of track from Lodhran to Peshawar (800 Km) to ensure sustained improvement in the turn round time of rolling stock and motive power;
ii. Manufacture of 51 locomotives;
iii. Rehabilitation of 101 diesel electric locomotives;
iv. Manufacture of 175 new design light-weight passenger coaches;
v. Equipping 7000 wagons with roller bearing;
vi. Revamping of 14 electric locomotives;
vii. Procurement of 1400 high capacity wagons;
viii. Procurement of 50 wagon movers;
ix. Introduction of Management Information System;
x. Improvement and Rehabilitation of track to cater for high speeds;
xi. Telecommunication and Signaling Network on main and important branch lines.