Kerala's second Vande Bharat logs 161.5% occupancy on first regular run

Palakkad: The first regular service of Kerala’s second Vande Bharat Express from Thiruvananthapuram to Kasaragod (train no: 20632) via Alappuzha on Tuesday turned out to be a huge success in terms of occupancy.

As this report is being published, the train with eight coaches and a total number of 530 seats that departed from Thiruvananthapuram Central at 4.05 pm will be carrying 856 passengers before it reaches its final destination, which means the occupancy will be 161.51 per cent.

As per official data, the maximum number of passengers (409) boarded from Thiruvananthapuram, while Kozhikode witnessed the most number of passengers deboarding (219).

In total, 20.9 per cent of passengers reserved tickets in the Thiruvananthapuram-Ernakulam stretch, while 12.3 per cent booked their seats for the Ernakulam-Kozhikode journey. The Ernakulam-Kannur and Thiruvananthapuram-Kozhikode stretch too have good occupancy.

Tirur railway station, which was included at the last moment in the list of stops of the second Vande Bharat Express, will have a total of 44 passengers utilising the service.

Alappuzha, another station included in the Vande Bharat Express service in Kerala, had 30 passengers boarding the train and 53 deboarding.

The total occupancy rate in the chair car coaches was 164.02 per cent and the executive car was 138.46 per cent.

"As the second Vande Bharat Express leaves Thiruvananthapuram at 4.05 pm and reaches the stations in peak hours, the service is going to be very convenient for passengers. We expect that the reservation rate will be high in the coming days as well," said a senior officer with the Thiruvananthapuram railway division.