With 785 Lego-like blocks, military battle tank wagons, and extensive rehearsals, Central Railway is meticulously preparing for the challenging task of widening an existing platform at the continuously packed Thane station. Understanding the difficulty of the 63-hour block, they have conducted multiple dress rehearsals and dry runs. The entire widened portion of the platform will be constructed using the 785 blocks, which have already been aligned, assembled, and laid out at Mulund. These will be transported to the site via a special train equipped with military wagons.

“So what we are doing at Thane is to slew the existing Kalyan-bound fast track to widen platforms 5/6 by two to three metres. The slewing of tracks will take the first 15 hours. Once that is done, the widening of the platform will be taken up. Normally, doing such work traditionally takes months, but here we have prepared hollow precast blocks of the entire length of the platform and they are about 785 in number and weighing two to three tonnes,” an official explained.