SRT prepares for New Year's travelling

BANGKOK, December 12 (TNA) - The State Railways of Thailand (SRT) will be providing comfortable and safe trips for passengers during the upcoming New Year festival. Thai Deputy Transport Minister Police Lieutenant General Chatt Kuldiloke told reporters Monday that he will call a meeting with SRT executives on December 14--at which he will instruct the SRT to ensure comfortable journeys and safety for the New Year revelers, covering well-maintenance trains and rail conditions. Police Lieutenant General Chatt said that he will also tell the SRT to speed up its procurement of new locomotives and further improvement of the national rail systems. Regarding a new high-speed rail project, the deputy transport minister acknowledged, citing an official study conducted by Bangkok's Office of Transport and Traffic Policy and Planning, that the project should use the standard 1.435-metre-dual tracks, in preparation for a cross-border rail-link network with neighboring countries in the foreseeable future; while the one-metre-dual tracks, the present Thai model, should also be developed at the same time to cater the country's growing rail services. According to the transport minister, a team of consultants will be hired to conduct a feasibility study on the country's new rail routes in details, with its completion set to be in time for a planned disbursement of a state budget in February 2012 under Thailand's 2012 fiscal year, beginning from October 1, 2011. Meanwhile, Soitip Traisuth, Director of the Office of Transport and Traffic Policy and Planning, said that Thailand's newly-developed one-metre-tracks will be used mainly for freight rail transport in suburban areas while the standard 1.435-metre tracks will be used for passenger rail transport, with first two routes, linking Bangkok with Chiang Mai in the North and Bangkok with Hua Hin in Upper South, scheduled to be inaugurated by 2017; whereas five new one-metre rail-lines should be opened by 2015. (TNA)