Chennai:
India's first vertical lift sea bridge at Pamban in southern Tamil Nadu will be opened in January to restore rail connectivity to Rameswaram Island from the country's mainland.
The 2.08 km bridge, constructed by Rail Vikas Nigam Limited (RVNL), is expected to enable Indian Railways to run trains at higher speed.
It is built parallel to an existing bridge built by the British and believed to be 110 years old.
Officials said that unlike the historic structure, the girders on each side of the new bridge will open like a butterfly to allow ships and other vessels to pass through. A lifting span of 72.5 meters long, 16 meters wide and 550 tons automatically weighs up to 17 meters.
Although the Commissioner for Railway Safety has approved the operation of trains on the bridge, he has identified significant concerns, including inadequate measures to combat corrosion and deviations from the original design of the girder.
However, authorities said the concerns are being addressed. “We have created a robust layer of 250 microns and it has qualified the CECRI (Central Electrochemical Research Institute) test,” said R Srinivasan, Senior Deputy General Manager of RVNL.
On complaints about design discrepancies, Mr. Srinivasan said, “It is a new concept and both IIT Madras and IIT Bombay have approved our design.” The original design was conceived by the Research Design and Standards Organization of the Indian Railways.
He also said that the bridge is ready for inauguration and the structure will last for a hundred years.
Train services between Mandapam on the mainland and Rameswaram Island were suspended on December 23, 2022 after the existing railway bridge was declared non-operational from a safety point of view. Severe corrosion had left it weak and unsuitable for operations, officials said.
Currently, all trains terminate at Mandapam and people use road routes to reach Rameswaram.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi had laid the foundation stone of the new bridge in November 2019. Work started in February 2020 and was due to be completed by December 2021, but the deadline was extended due to the Covid-19 pandemic.