Patiala State Monorail Trainways
The Patiala State Monorail Trainways(PSMT) was a unique rail-guided, partially road-borne railways system running in Patiala from 1907 to 1927.
Maharaja Sir Bhupinder Singh of the Princely Patiala State got this unique railway system constructed to facilitate movement of people and goods in his state. The chief engineer of this project was Colonel C W Bowles who had earlier successfully used monorail based on Ewing System (designed by William Thorold) during his stint as engineer for the Bengal-Nagpur Railway when responsible for the Construction works at Kharagpur used for transportation of construction materials . Colonel Bowles was made chief Engineer for the PSMT project. One of the objects of PSMT was to make use of the 560 mules being maintained by Patiala State. Apart from mules, bullocks were also used to haul the monorail before introduction of steam locomotives on the route of PSMT. [1]
The total distance covered by PSMT was 50 miles (80 km). PSMT was run on two unconnected lines. The lines were constructed by the firm of Marsland and Price, based in Bombay.
- Sirhind to Morinda, a distance of 15 miles (24 km). At Sirhind there was a connection to the North Western Railway ‘Ambala-Ludiana SectionMainline’ and the line was opened as far as Basi, 5 miles(8km). It was proposed to extend this line to Ropar but since Ropar was connected by a railway line, this idea was abandoned.
- Patiala to Sunam, a distance of 35 miles(56 km) via Basi[2], 5 miles(8km) from Sirhind where there was a connection to the North Western Railway.
The published information about PSMT is very limited:-
- The 1908 edition of the Imperial Gazetteer of India )[2] in which there was a brief mention. The gazetteer simply stated that "a mono-rail tramway, opened in February, 1907, connects Basi with the railway at Sirhind".
- The pre-opening examination report carried out by the NWR in December 1908 reported that the line was to be worked by mule power to start but ‘two steam .. and one .. petrol monorail engines had been ordered’. The report also confirmed that the line between ‘Sirhind and Bassi, a distance of 6 miles(9.6km) had been completed’ and it hzad four passenger vehicles and 30 goods vehicles. The passenger vehicle carried 18 to 20 people and the goods vehicles 82 maunds. The report described the platforms, lines and operations of the monorail. It reported an average working speed of 8 miles per hour but a trial run over 1½ miles(2.4km) with one car and four artilliary horses gave a speed of nearly 20 miles per hour [3].
- An ordnance map of 1913 also shows a tramway running along west side of road, but does not mention the PSMT by name.
Apart from the above, PSMT has not been mentioned in any official documents of that period in India.
It is generally thought that the PSMT closed when the opening in 1927-28 of the North Western Railway(NWR)'s Sirhind-Rupar Railway line made the Patiala State Monorail Trainways obsolete together with any plan to extend the line from Morinda to Rupar.
However adverts were placed by the Punjab Public Works Department in the 2 Jul 1921 edition of ‘Indian Engineering’ offering monorail trucks, passenger cars, locomotives etc for sale and in the 25 July 1925 edition it offers the whole of the tramway with the statement ‘although the line is a monorail, the wagons and carriages are suitable for conversion to narrow gauge at not too much extra cost’ [3].
Further information and later history of the locomotives is given in Railways and Locomotives of India and South Asia” compiled by Simon Darvill [3].
Monorail System
The PMST was the second monorail system in India, after the Kundale Valley Light Railway, and the only operational locomotive-hauled railway system built using the Ewing System in the world.
The Kundala Valley Railway pre-dated this, also using the Ewing system between 1902 and 1908, although this only used bullocks for haulage. Following the conversion of the Kundala Valley Railway from a monorail to a narrow gauge railway in 1908, the PSMT was the only monorail system in India until its closure in 1927.
External Links
- "Patiala State Monorail Trainways" Wikipedia
- "Patiala Monorail Reappraisal" by Simon Darvill, 2012 – ‘Sirhind to Morinda Line’ IRFCA Indian Railways Fan Club
References
- ↑ "The Railway Magazine, February 1969, pages 72-76, reproduced by IRFCA (Indian Railways Fan Club); Retrieved on 18 Apr 2016
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Imperial Gazetteer of India, v. 7, p. 95. Basi"; Retrieved 22 Dec 2015
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 “Industrial Railways and Locomotives of India and South Asia” compliled by Simon Darvill. Published by ‘The Industrial Railway Society’ 2013. ISBN 978 1 901556 82-7. Available at http://irsshop.co.uk/India. Reference: Entry PB10 page ....
