Railways in Touch with e-Commerce Firms to Make Parcel Vans

NEW DELHI: After launching its first high capacity parcel van on the Linke Hofmann Busch platform in January this year, the Indian Railways has manufactured 12 more of the specially designed parcel vans to ensure smooth supply of essential goods during the lockdown.

The parcel vans that can run at a speed of 130 kmph were manufactured at Kapurthalabased Rail Coach Factory (RCF) after it resumed operations on April 23. The coaches have a capacity of 24 tonnes and foldable 2-tier luggage racks to facilitate transportation of goods. The LHB parcel vans are meant to generate revenue for the railways through a parcel transportation business.

“The coaches have collapsible partitions and sliding main doors for rapid loading and unloading. Thirty-five more coaches are being made and will be ready by next week,” said a senior official at RCF Kapurthala. The official added that the LHB parcel vans were different from Integral Coach factory (ICF) coaches. The ICF coaches are conventional coaches in use since 1950s.

The railways is also in touch with firms like Amazon and Flipkart to develop e-commerce parcel vans that can help reduce transportation time and carry huge containers with radio frequency identification tags. “These e-commerce vans can attain speed up to 160 kmph and have a GPS tracker in coaches,” a top railway official said.

Source: Railpost

Image Courtesy: Rail Post