By P. K. Balachandran

COLOMBO – Dr. Lalithasiri Gunaruwan, Professor of Economics at the University of Colombo, has picked holes in the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-funded Kelani Valley (KV) rail project meant to serve a thickly populated area in south east Colombo. But Dr. Dimantha De Silva, Senior Lecturer of Transport at the University of Moratuwa and a consultant to the Colombo Sub-urban Railway Project (CSRP), has debunked Dr. Gunaruwan’s criticisms.

There is a video in circulation in which Dr. Gunaruwan is seen reporting to President Gotabaya Rajapaksha that upgrading a 23km section between Homagama and Maradana on the proposed Kelani Valley (KV) line will save only 5 minutes of travel time, thus questioning the value of the project.

“This is a complete misrepresentation misleading the President,” said Dr. De Silva, pointing out that the current travel time on the line between Homagama and Maradana is 68 min and it will be reduced to 42 min once the line is upgraded to a modern one.

“We know how Dr. Gunaruwan got the numbers mixed up, which was pointed out to him by officials in the Treasury, who had done a cross check. But the question is why he is hanging on to his mistake as seen in his latest video released on ‘A5 Channel Sri Lanka’?” Dr. De Silva asked.

In regard to the criticism that a 30sec stop has been assumed at stations in the travel time calculation, Dr. De Silva said it was done with train simulation software. “It is very common in modern metro rails to operate with 30sec stop time, enabled with same level platform and train floors, wide doors and with around 3 to 4 doors in each compartment allowing many people to get in and out at the same time. Even at the Shinjuku station in Japan, which is the world’s busiest station with more than 3.65million passenger using it daily, the stop time is 30sec and only goes to 1min during peak times. All in other stations around the world that have similar passenger demands, 30sec is considered more than enough,” Dr. De Silva pointed out.

He went on to say that it was understandable that some people were using the current train system to question the 30sec stop time it, but people who have travelled abroad and used modern trains would not question it.

“It is true that there are only 30,000 passengers using the KV line currently as it is the most neglected railway line with constant breakdowns and therefore very unreliable. But going by train is faster than by car or bus even now. The reason why people don’t use rail is because they can’t, even if they want to. The trains are already full. The single track and outdated signal system do not allow more trains to be added. The trains in the current KV line are also very unreliable, as the delay data shows that they have a delay close to 15-30mins.” he explained.

Expected high demand

The KV line now caters to 8 trains in the morning (3 in the peak hour running at 20 min frequency) and 8 Trains in the evening (3 in the peak hour). Therefore, all the trips are taken during this 6-hour peak period.

“But with the number of daily trains increasing by more than three times to 60 trains and peak time headway of 7 min, running throughout the day, there is enough supply to attract demand. Reliability, the station upgrade, better connectivity to stations and comfort with AC, will attract the passengers to the train,” he was confident.

Computer simulation and modelling undertaken based on scientific methods estimate that the demand between Kirilapone and Nugegoda, which is the section with maximum demand, will have 176,000 passenger trips in 2025 and 202,000 passenger trips by 2035, De Silva said.

The total passenger demand on the KV line will be 273,566 per day in 2025 and 365,731 in year 2035 as per the final feasibility report released on April 11, 2019, he added. The question on variable demands as alleged by Dr. Gunaruwan in his video released recently, could be because he had mixed up the numbers defined as sectional volumes and the number of total passenger trips, which was used technically to calculate the number of trains required, De Silva pondered.

“These are clear to an experienced transport planner but can be sometimes confusing to a person not engaged frequently in such projects,” he added.

Cost not high

Once the detail design was completed, the final project cost was reported in the final feasibility report, released on April 2019, as US$ 1.424 billion. It is alleged that the project cost of US$ 2.52 billion reported in September 2018, went down without any reason because the Institute of Engineers Sri Lanka (IESL) reported it. However, Dr. De Silva wondered to why the issue comes up over and over again when it had been explained and detailed well enough to members of IESL since late 2018.”

Noting that the issue of cost being high was first raised by the ADB and the Project Management Unit on September 18, 2018, on the day of the progress presentation, and during the initial report submission, which had been later highlighted by the IESL as well, he said it was common to have multiple submissions of project reports during the study period, which allows the clients to provide feedback as progress is made in the study. The US$ 2.5 billion cost he said was an initial estimate and the price was estimated in Sri Lanka rupees at an exchange rate of Rs 150 per US$.  “Once the detail cost estimations were completed and the exchange rate was corrected at Rs 179 /US$, the cost came down to US$ 1.4 billion USD,” he explained, claiming it was childish for the IESL group to keep claiming credit, and repeating a matter that was resolved at the end of 2018 after having been accepted by the ADB and the client.

He also noted that the committee headed by Dr. Gunaruwan appointed in May 2020, had, in its Terms of Reference, the evaluation of the final report submitted in April 2019, adding, “It is surprising a matter that had been resolved is being raised again.”

Need for elevation

Responding to criticism that elevation is a waste of money and going at grade is less costly and a better option, Dr. De Silva noted there were 148 railway level crossings from Maradana to Avissawella; 75 crossings up to Padukka and 56 crossings up to Homagama and that at grade level crossings, the delay to the road network would be very high. “At Baseline road, a 450-metre vehicle queue is created even now running trains at 20min frequency. Just imagine the impact it would have with trains running every 7min in the future,” he asked, explain that they had used simulation software to evaluate the future impact and it was found that the queue would be 800 metres with current traffic and around 1km with future traffic flow.

“Similarly the existing road network will be highly congested if not grade separated,” he said elaborating that according to a 2017 survey, 20 major road crossings up to Malapalla have more than 12,000 vehicles crossing the level crossings per day, and if the traffic increases further it will need either the road or the railway to be elevated.

“If fly overs are not included, safety concerns at crossings and the cost to the society and cost of operating the level crossings must be considered separately,” he said, adding that the alternate option of going at grade with road flyovers was estimated at US$ 200million extra. This, he said was because a 14.5m width is required for at grade, while 12m is needed for elevated viaduct.

“Therefore, going at grade will require additional acquisition all along the corridor which will in turn create problems like closing down 9 kms of parallel roads, including highly used roads such as Railway Avenue having access to houses and commercial properties outside the railway reservation.”Dr. De Silva pointed out.

Curves

Responding to critics who say the tight curves were not corrected in the elevated section, Dr. De Silva said it would have been ideal to straighten the curves, but the study team looked at the best possible return of investment. “Straightening the curves would increase the speed to allow only a 5-minute travel time saving compared to the proposed design, which straightens the curves as much as possible with minimum acquisition,” he said, adding, the land acquisition cost itself would be over US$ 24 million, and the total cost of straightening, even with the reduction of length by 1.7 kms was very high. Doing it for a 5-min time gain with all the social impacts due to relocation in a highly urbanized area was not the best option, he said, explain that the main reason behind no speed gain is because the KV line has a specialty compared to other suburban rail, where the rail stations are located very close to each other.

There are 24 stations in 35 km length between Maradana and Paduka. The distance between the stations vary from 0.6 to 1.9kms. Therefore, trains cannot achieve maximum speeds even with a straight crow fly line generated, he pointed out.

Freight movement

The issue of freight movement has also been held up as a critical point under the new plan, with claims that freight movement is not possible by elevation as loading and unloading cannot be done. Dr. De Silva countered the claims, pointing out that less than 2% of goods transport is done with rail. Freight traffic has actually declined since 2010, with 98% of the freight handled by rail being for cement inputs and oil products.

Dr. De Sivla  pointed out that there is no current demand for freight movement along the KV corridor, except for parcel delivery, and there is no demand projected for future either. The short distance fright hauling is anyways more economical by trucks, he noted.

“There is no need to provide loading unloading provisions at elevated section. If a need arises the facilities can be created. There is no restrictions for parcel movement happening right now and also there is no restriction even to container freight trains to run in the elevated track as assumed by some, as the design has been done to accommodate loads and size of container cars.  In case freight movement is to be considered, that option is available,” he added.

Multiple socio-economic benefits

The transport expert said critics had not considered the other benefits of an elevated line, and pointed out that the space created underneath the elevated viaduct was proposed to be used as bicycle paths and walking paths connected with public spaces. The additional land was proposed to be leased for commercial activities such as kiosks used as additional income generators for the operations on top of ticket revenue. In addition, electrification would require fencing if going at grade. The railway track itself would be a physical barrier separating communities. Extra connectivity is established between the communities in a highly urbanized area by going elevated, he said.

– -P K. Balachandran is a senior Colombo-based journalist who in the past two decades, has reported for The Hindustan Times, The New Indian Express and the Economist