• First Impressions by Reginald Sowler
• A Visit to the Grand Canyon Railway by P J Singh
• Peter Bawcutt -- An Appreciation by Terry Martin
• Getting the Railways Back on the Right Track -- Challenge of the Millennium by M N Prasad

When the ship headed east from Aden with its destroyer escort our destination became clear, we were going to India. We disembarked at Bombay on the 1st January 1944, the docks seemed so hot as we carried all our kit and equipment to the train. What a relief to be sat down in the carriage. These were six of us in the compartment, which was third class of course.

After a long wait the train pulled out at 1.10pm, but our destination was still unknown. At the head of the train was Bombay Baroda and Central India Railway (BB & CIR) class H 4-6-0 No. 550. The train was comprised of fourteen fully laden coaches. The first thing of railway interest to come into view was the Bombay goods yards. Numerous 2-6-0 tank engines of the Bombay Port Trust were at work including number 11, 14, 18, 23, 24, 31 and 32. Also present were the two large 2-1 0-2 tanks 25H and 26H; it was many years later that I found out that they were the only ten coupled engines they possessed. At Waldala Junction one of the Great Indian Penisnsular Railway electrics, number 4502 was noted.

A few more locomotives were seen before reaching Bulsar, 121 miles from Bombay but they were mainly class H 4-6-0 of the BB & CIR. Amongst the engines seen here at Bulsar was 558 another H class 4-6-0 which was very clean in brown livery lined out with cream. At this point H class 550 which had hauled the train came off to be replaced by another member of the class No. 363. At Udhana, now 151 miles from Bombay the following BB & CIR engines were seen, class F 0-6-0 No.213 class Dl 4-4-0 No. 258 and an 0-6-2 tank No. 10, the only one of that class that I saw. By this time it was getting dark and all that was left to see was the scene of activity at each station as we passed. Gradually as the night wore on we began to realise that Indian nights can be quite cold. We must have fallen asleep at some point and we finally came to rest in Ratlam at 7.00am.

The locomotive which had brought us from Baroda was yet another BB & CIR H class 4-6-0 No. 527 and a long queue moved along the side of the train to get their rations. It was here that I made my first acquaintance with kite hawks. Keeping my food covered with my hand and arm I managed to get back to the carriage alright. Some were not so lucky and saw their food removed from in front of their eyes.

Ratlam was quite busy with the following BB & CIR engines being seen. C Class 2-8-0 No. 130 and 145, H class 4-6-0 No. 548, 552 and 557, and XD 2-8-2 No. 706 and 708. On the metre gauge class F3 0-6-0 No. 794. Passing Ratlam shed were the usual H class 4-6- Os No. 527, 530 and 537 and also M class 2-8-2 No. 701. Further metre gauge locomotives were seen P class 4-6-0 No. 78 and also No. 415, an 0-6-2 tender engine of class YF, this was the first time I had seen this type of locomotive.

>From Ratlam, we passed lndore with class YF 0-6-2 No. 424 and a class F2 0-6-0 No. 764 to be seen. Finally we were backed into a siding at Mhow by No. 326, one of the class D metre gauge 4-6-4 tanks. We had arrived, some 491 miles from Bombay.

The Indian Bradshaw of May 1943 gave a Sentinel Service between Indore and Mhow twice daily in each direction but I never saw any sign of it.

A few days after arriving in Mhow, the 15th January 1944 to be exact I went to Mhow shed. I am not sure that the Army would have approved of this, but as I did not meet anyone to say it was out of bounds, all was well. The shed staff were very friendly and I was able to a wander about at will. There were 18 engines on shed as follows: D2 class 4-6-4 tanks No. 113, 133, 325, and 355, D class 4-6-4 tank No. 326, M2 class No. 399 President Wilson YF class 0-6-2s No. 481, 482, 484, 487, O class 4-4-0 No. 63, F2 class 0-6-Os No. 764, 778 and 779.

After this friendly reception I made several visits to the shed. As I became known to the staff I was allowed to ride on the engine footplates as they moved about the shed yard. The general situation in the shed remained much the same whenever I visited it, although occasionally these would be something new. On the 30th January 1944 for instance No. 884 a class P 4-6-0 was in the shed under repair.

A series of these notes, compiled by Reginald Sowler in his personal diary during his posting to the Indian subcontinent in 1944-45 as an Allied Army Soldier, will appear in the future ISRS Newsletters.

The Santa Fe Railway’s greatest gift to the visitors was laying of the track from Williams to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. It was completed in 1901 and the first group of visitors travelled by it on September 17, 1901.

During the 65 miles trip one can sit back in the old, fully restored Hariman Coaches and enjoy the scenery of enchanting Pondorora pine forests, wide open plains and winding Canyons. The train is pulled by 2-8-0 steam or the 1950 vintage Alco F.4. The journey crosses the old 182 feet long wooden trestle bridge on the Cataract Canyon. The bridge is very well preserved and safe at full speed running of Trains.

Throughout the journey, strolling musicians and western characters entertain the travellers. The Grand Canyon Railway Depot is a magnificent log structure and was completed in 1910. It is only 200 meters from the Bright Angle Lodge on the Southern Rim. All the original equipment is intact and in working order. For a short period the passenger service was discontinued but now there is a daily service due to the increase in passenger traffic and also due to the efforts of the Railways to make it a succesful tourist attraction.

Starting from Chicago for Los Angles the South West Chief whisks you across 8 states for a halt at Williams Junction, Arizona. Here the visitors spend the night at the historic Fray Marcos Hotel. After the morning breakfast at Max Thelma Hotel, a free trip to the Railway Museum and exciting Gun Fights, wild west shows the visitors leave for the Grand Canyon Railway. On the return journey to Williams, Marshal Goodmore disposes off the bandits who hold up the train.

Williams is located on the Historic Route 66, which has now been dismantled, after 75 years service to the nation and replaced by US 40. Some portions are left like through Williams and its now called Historic Route 66. Its 75 years are being celebrated in September 2001.

For further information contact:
Trainmaster
Williams, Arizona 86046
Fax: +1 520-635-2060
E-mail : ewhite@thetrain.com

Much has been written about the rocky splendour of the Grand Canyon which is one of the seven natural wonders of the world. It is 277 miles long, 10 miles wide and nearly a mile deep. It hosts 5 millions visitors annually and the architects have taken great care in designing the lodges, motels and cafes which blend with the natures splendor.

Way back in 1960 I drove on R-66 from Stillwater, Okhlahoma through the states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona to the Southern Rim of the Canyon. Trekking down the Canyon to where the Colorodo River Flows was quite a exhausting and a rewarding experience. Now after 39 years in May 2001, it could only be viewed from the Southern Rim.

For Indian visitors it will be interesting to note that some of the most impressive formations and magnificent rock temples aflame with changing colours in the Grand Canyon are named, Brahma Temple, Deva Temple, Vishnu Temple, Krishna Shrine, Rama Shrine, and then there is a lot more to see, the mighty Colorado River, Wild life, the sunrise and sunset, Native American Villages and shopping for the handicrafts.

The hymn "All things bright and beautiful ..." could be heard resounding with great gusto outside the village church of Herne in Kent. Indeed, there could not have been more appropriate words for the family and friends to sing, for they had come together to pay their last respects to Peter Bawcutt.

I had first known of Peter when I was a schoolboy, for I would spend hours journeying across the pages of my atlas, travelling on the railways captured by his incomparable photographs that took me far across the shifting sands of the Middle East to my ultimate goal, India. As the years passed, my dreams of travel became a reality, but it was not until I fell under the spell of the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway that I had the privilege of actually meeting him. He had grown up in England during the 1920s, his home being close to the Southern Railway in Herne Bay.

In 1933 Dr. Patrick Ransome-Wallis took up residence five doors away, and he took Peter under his wing by teaching him the art and skills of railway photography. They became life-long friends. The Second World War took Peter on a troopship to Suez, where he spent four years in active service and became fluent in Arabic. Despite the scarcity of good film and materials, along with the adverse conditions of the hostilities and climate, he was able to take over 200 photographs of the railways during this period. In 1948 he obtained work with the Iraq Petroleum Company, where he was to stay for the next 26 years. The opportunities for railway photography were few and far between at times during this period, for it included 14 years of service spent in the Gulf Sheikhdoms which saw no trains at all! However, it was during his leave that he was able to travel to the Indian Subcontinent, where he developed a consummate passion for the railways and their operation. He became close friends with Hugh Hughes, who had meticulously researched so much through the India Office, and together they recorded their work in a series of articles for the Railway Magazine and a superb quartet of books on Indian Railways.

My approach to Peter with research into the DHR was met with the delightful enthusiasm that was his hallmark, and I was honoured to become his friend.

His knowledge had not been gained from the armchair but from experience, and many a times we would natter late into the night as I learned about his beloved railways. Munching into cream cakes, he would tell me with mischievous humour of the times he spent dodging officials during the war in order to capture the trains on film, of the numerous diplomatic tangles encountered in Arabia and of his huge respect for the railwaymen of India. Such was his love of the Subcontinent that he built a magnificent model railway in the loft that covered the entire area of his house, and set it on his beloved imaginary island of Coromandel.

Rarely seen without a collar, tie and jacket, he was a dignified English gentleman of the old order ... and in every sense a gentle man. Tragically he fell victim to carcinoma of the oesophagus, but such was his humour that in the rare moments of referring to his treatment, he would talk of having a "quick fry-up", and then get on with the real business of railways! I was deeply moved when he asked me to help him with his unique photographic collection, and together we collated the 1280 prints of his proudest work. The project is still continuing, as does the ambition to honour his memory with a book of his achievements.

He passed away peacefully on 20th May in Canterbury Hospital, with two young nurses holding his hands. Those who knew him could not help but smile through the tears, and would not have been surprised to learn of a train waiting for him on the other side, bound for Coromandel.

I miss him so much, for he was undoubtedly all things bright and beautiful.

In 1985, with 15 years to go for dawn of the new millennium, IR had framed a Corporate Plan of its own, for the total development of the system, to be achieved during the period 1985-2000. It was, in fact, the perspective plan on which the three 5-year Plans from VII to IX were to be based.

The Corporate Mission for IR, as spelt out in the Corporate Plan document, was "to be modern railway system with sufficient capacity to meet the country’s transport needs, both for passenger and freight traffic, based on an optimum inter-modal mix, and to provide this transportation at the least cost to the society, while maintaining the financial viability of the system". It was, indeed, a beautiful definition, in consonance with IR's traditional role as the life-line of the Nation. It was something which, if faithfully pursued, would have helped the Railways to serve the country well in the new millennium.

Unfortunately, the entire planning of IR, both for network development and for capacity augmentation, as envisaged,originally for the VIII and IX Plans happened to undergo some drastic changes, consequent on the successive changes in the Government at the Centre from 1991 onwards. As a result, the dawn of the new millennium has found IR relatively under-equipped to fulfil its legitimate role in the overall transport scenario of the country. The concept of sufficiency of capacity, optimality of inter-modal split, least cost to society and financial viability of the system, all seem to have been compromised as a result of the changes in policy and priorities of the political leadership.

This article attempts to focus attention on the growing capacity saturation of our railway system, for want of need-based inputs in recent years, and the steps to be taken to remedy the situation. It also stresses the importance of adopting an integrated approach to transport planning, based on an optimal split between rail and road, to achieve the utmost economy in petroleum products.

Compared to roads, the railways are 4.5 times more energy-efficient in the case of freight traffic and twice as energy-efficient in the case of passenger traffic. However, the railways are at a disadvantage in regard to: (a) Inability to provide door-to-door services; and (b) Public funding needed for the entire system and its operation, not merely for the infrastructure, as in roads.

Railways are ideally suited for medium to long-distance movement of passengers and goods, as well as for shorter distances where the quantum of traffic is too large to moved by road.

In view of the foregoing, it is now well recognised that planning of railway development should not be done in isolation, but be dovetailed with that of other modes of transport, so as to achieve an optimal solution that is most cost-effective.

Traditionallly, the bulk of domestic traffic is shared between road and rail. Over the past 50 years the Railways’ share of passengers traffic has come down from 75% to around 20% and that of goods from 88% to about 36%. This declining trend can be attributed to: (a) Roads being more readily accessible to people along the route; (b) Capacity limitations being more specific on the railways.

The country’s transport infrastructures, both rail and road, are grossly inadequate of cope with growing needs of traffic. This situation has arisen mainly due to the insufficiency of plan allocations during the past 30 years. In the first three 5-year Plans, the allocation for the Transport sector had averaged 23% of the total Plan outly; but it dropped to 13.8% (average) during the next six Plan periods. The railway’s share for these two periods were 14% and 6.1%, respectively. The reduction was too drastic.

A fair idea of capacity saturation of the Railways can be had from the fact that, over the 48 year period of planned development form 1951 to 1999, rail-borne freight traffic (net t-km) has increased 6.44 times and passenger traffic (pass.km) 5.36 times. But the increases in route length and total running track length were only 17% and 37%, respectively. Even in regard to rolling stock, the wagon capacity has grown only 2.56 times, the number of passenger coaches 2.29 times and the total tractive effort of the locomotive fleet 2.24 times, during the same period. This was achieved by more efficient use of the available resources, including staff, whose strength increased only 1.73 times. By around 1990, a stage had already been reached when any further increase in output would require commensurate additional inputs.

IRs Corporate Plan (1985-2000) had envisaged a 100% growth in freight traffic output during the 15 year period. The original draft for the VIII Plan, prepared in 1989, had proposed a stepping up of the annual growth rate of freight traffic to 5%, as against the average of 3.8% achieved during the period 1971-91. This, incidentally, would have prevented further decline in the Railways’ share of the total traffic and thus helped save considerable foreign exchange on petroleum. Unfortunately, all these plans suffered a serious setback from 1991 onwards, consequent on an overnight shift in investment policy and priorities, from need based development aimed at capacity augmentation on economic considerations, to certain grandiose and populist schemes aimed at promoting the political interests of those in power for the time being. These included the over-ambitious scheme of wholesale gauge conversion (or the so-called Project Uniguage), in stark contrast to the earlier policy of selective and need-based conversions. Overriding priority for this scheme from 1992 onwards has resulted in a drastic slowing down of real capacity augmentation, both infrastructure and rolling stock. Side by side, several other unproductive schemes, like unremunerative new lines, redundant creation of several new railway Zones (a most retrograde step in these days of IT revolution), etc. have been launched by the successive governments, in utter disregard of the corporate mission of the Railways.

It had been a long established tradition, especially in the post-Nehru era, for Railway Ministers to do some special favours to their respective States and constituencies. But it was in the post 1991 period that the Railways Ministers started playing about with matters of policy and organisation, causing irreparable damage to the system. They have also gone to the extent of ignoring the sane advice given by the Parliament’s own Standing Committee against the manner in which Gauge Conversions and New Zones’ formation were being progressed without proper justification.

The aforesaid aberrations in IRs investment policies during the past 9 years have led to the following adverse fall-outs:

1. The average annual growth rate of freight output,which was to have been stepped up from 3.8% to 5%, has dropped to a never-before low of 2.2%. The excess diversion of freight from rail to road on this account during the 8 year period 1991-99 is estimated to have resulted in wasteful extra consumption of petroleum (HSD) to the tune of 3 million tonnes, besides adding to the congestion on roads.
2. The average annual growth of passenger traffic has dropped form 4.6% to 3.2%. This again has resulted in extra spill-over to the roads.
3. Reduced production of passenger coaches, coupled with diversion of sizeable number of coaches and locomotives to replace MG trains on newly gauge-converted sections, has worsened the conditions of travel for the common man.
4. Track renewals have gone into heavy arrears, resulting in increased incidence of rail failures.
5. Consequent on slowing down of traffic growth, IR has had to hike the fares and freight rates very substantially, in order balance the yearly budget.
6. In the last few years, the Railway Ministers have been resorting to over optimistic projections of revenue earnings, which ultimately results in drastic cuts in Plan expenditure, because of the shortfall in earnings.
7. In the 2000-01 Budget, the Railways have actually gone into the red with default of Rs. 1500 Crore in dividend payment to the general exchequer. This is indicative of the dire financial straits in IR has been landed.

IR today has the dubious distinction of being the only major railway system in the world where major decisions on investment policy and organisation are taken by politicians according to their whims and fancies. This has, perhaps, been helped by the fact that railway projects had always been kept out of the purview of the Public Investment Board, because of the Railway Ministry being professionally managed with its own finance headed by Financial Commissioner who is accountable to the Finance Minister as well. It needs to be examined how such a system hasfailed so miserably in the post 1991 period.

The future of railway development appears to be bleak, as things stand, unless some damage control measures are taken immediately to arrest and,if possible, reverse the downhill trends. These will necessarily have to include the following: