Central Railway: Seating arrangement in local trains reverted to original

One of the modified coaches with the sets of seats nearest to the door removed for more standing space

Two years after altering seating arrangements by removing a few seats from local trains to tackle the increase in commuter crowd, Central Railway has reverted to the earlier compartment layout following negative feedback from the public.

The alterations
CR in December 2015 had decided to increase space in compartments by adopting two methods - in the first, it aligned the seats longitudinally, like in Metro trains (parallel to the window), but this was panned by a majority; in the second, CR removed three sets of seats right next to the door to accommodate more standees, and received mixed reactions.

The modification, done in eight days by the team of Carriage and Wagon Workshop in Matunga, was made in the first, fourth, sixth, ninth and 10th coaches from Kalyan-end, creating additional capacity for carrying 56 passengers per coach. The entire 12-car train thus had an increased capacity for 336 passengers.

Panned from all sides
However, the last two years brought in a lot of criticism for the arrangement, especially from commuters travelling to Kalyan and beyond. "It would have been fine if the trains with fewer seats were run short distances, till Kurla or Thane, but it wasn't right to take these trains to far-off areas, beyond Kalyan, a journey that takes an average of three hours. No one can stand for such a long period," Ankush Mehta, a regular commuter, said.

Railway officials said it was difficult to allot trains as per destinations. "One train makes 12 to 14 trips a day as per the 'rake link' or its timetable, and this includes long and short journeys. Hence, one does not have control over such decisions," a senior official said.

Central Railways' Chief Public Relations Officer Sunil Udasi, in media statement, said, "In order to enhance passenger-carrying capacity of EMU trains, seat modifications were done in eight local rakes on a pilot basis. It has now been decided to restore the original seating arrangement, on the basis of passenger feedback received over a period of time." Passenger association member Subhash Gupta welcomed the rollback saying "better late than never".

08 Number of trains the modification was made in
05 Number of coaches per local having the modification
56 Number of additional commuters a modified coach could fit in
336 Number of additional commuters the entire train could accommodate

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