Northern Railways floats tenders of 6.15 crore to fix Kalka-Shimla heritage track

Among the works to be completed as per the tenders is slope protection and landslide monitoring system, tunnel grouting, bridge rehabilitation and replacement of retaining walls. The closing date of the tenders is August 10 and the work is estimated to be completed within 45 days of being awarded.

The Kalka-Shimla Railway is a 96-km-long, narrow gauge single track working rail link built in the mid-19th century to provide a service to the town of Shimla. The railway route passes through Haryana and Himachal Pradesh. Its construction was planned in the mid-19th century to provide a service to Shimla, at an altitude of more than 2,000 meters, which at the time was the summer residence of the colonial government.

The construction, particularly difficult in a mountain environment for two-thirds of the entire line’s length, required a great deal of engineering design work, and was finally completed at the turn of the century (1899-1903). The world’s highest multi-arc gallery bridge and the world’s longest tunnel (at the time of construction) of this railway stands testimony to the brilliant engineering skills of the time.

Geographically, the line passes through three districts in the two states. Section 1 is from Kalka station to just before Taksal (km 3.7), in Panchkula district, of Haryana. Section 2 is from Taksal to near Kathlee Ghat (km 74.2), in Solan district, of Himachal Pradesh. Section 3 is from Kathlee Ghat to the end of the line at Shimla station (km 96.6), in Shimla district, of Himachal Pradesh.

It runs from the town of Kalka, at an altitude of 656 m, from which point it extends the standard gauge Indian railway network towards the Himalayan mountains.

The line then rises to an intermediate plateau at an altitude of around 1500 m, where it serves several stations, and then it climbs to the terminus town of Shimla, capital of the state of Himachal Pradesh, at an altitude of 2,075 m.

The line has 988 bridges and viaducts, which represent 3% of total line length. The largest bridges have multiarch masonry galleries (74), sometimes in several levels, like Roman aqueducts. The line has 917 curves, representing some 70% of total length. Most of these are sharp curves all along the line, and continue even in tunnels and bridges.

The line initially had 107 tunnels. As a result of landslides, this number has been reduced to 102. The total length of the tunnels represents 8% of the line’s length. There are a large number of masonry retaining walls which need repair due to the rain damage, inform senior railway officials.