New Delhi:

The upcoming Pamban Railway Bridge is India’s first vertical lift bridge, connecting mainland India and Rameswaram Island. Apart from its mechanical characteristics and rough seas, its sharp turns have become another challenge faced by railway companies. A challenge.

Vikas Nigam Railway Ltd (RVNL), which is constructing the 2.08 km long bridge, is extending the 72.5 m long, 16 m wide and 550 ton lift span from Rameshwaram to 450 m into the sea and fixing it to the bridge superior.

“We started moving this span on March 10 and so far we have moved the 550-tonne span 80 m towards the center of the bridge. The biggest challenge is the alignment of the bridge’s 2.65-degree bend. If it were straight, We could have moved it faster,” said a senior RVNL official, adding that the curved shape was necessary due to various alignment changes.

The movement of the lift span to its final fixing point will be completed by the end of May, as a further 370 m still needs to be moved.

“Once we got through the curve, we could speed up its movement. We took huge precautions while moving it in the sea because its size and weight required every step to be very precise,” the official said.

RVNL has set a deadline of June 30 for the bridge to become operational, and its officials say they are doing their best to meet the requirement.

“Once the lift span is determined, the rest of the work is not a big deal,” an RVNL official said.

He added, “This lift span can be automatically raised to 17 m to facilitate the passage of ships. The ascent will take five minutes and the same time for descent and will be arranged in such a way so that train services will not” be disturbed. “RVNL uses a lift span designed by Spanish company TYPSA and manufactured at Sattirakkudi railway station, 20 kilometers from the coast.

“We separated it into different components and assembled it on the coast as it was not possible to move such a huge structure from the manufacturing point,” RVNL officials said.

Train services between mainland Mandapam and Rameswaram island were suspended on December 23, 2022 after the existing railway bridge built in 1913 was declared out of service due to safety concerns.

A Southern Railway official said, “When the Pamban Bridge is commissioned, trains usually run up to the bridge and reach Rameshwaram. The trains run slowly on the Pamban Bridge and reach the pilgrim town in about 15 minutes .”

Currently, all trains terminate at Mandapam and people reach Rameswaram by road. Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid the foundation stone of the new bridge parallel to the old bridge in November 2019 and RVNL started construction in February 2020.

The project was originally scheduled to be completed in December 2021, but the deadline was extended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to Southern Railway, the 2.08-km-long bridge will enable Indian Railways to operate trains at higher speeds and will also increase traffic between mainland India and Rameswaram island.

Until a road bridge was constructed in 1988, train services were the only link between Mandapam and Rameswaram Island in the Gulf of Mannar.

According to Southern Railway, the substructure of the bridge has been double-tracked, and the navigation span will also have double-track regulations.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)