Thiruvananthapuram Central railway station gets ISO certificate

10 May 2019 Editorial Team

Thiruvananthapuram Central railway station has been awarded the ISO certification for being replete with necessary facilities including a clean environment. Also, plans are in to increase the processing capacity and establish a solar panel at the station. The station bagged the certification for facilities including LED lights, energy saving fans and AC, emergency hospital service, baby feeding centre, women passenger facilitation centre, especially for cancer patients, escalators and lifts.

Nearly 2.5 tonne of waste is generated from 15 trains stationed at the Thiruvananthapuram Central railway station on a daily basis. However, the station contains the capacity to process only about one tonne per day of the produced waste, which includes biodegradable and non-biodegradable waste. Sanitation works such as track, train and platform cleaning has been outsourced to different contractors. Also, a waste collection centre situated at the rear end of the station is reportedly used to process garbage collected from the trains. The waste including the waste collected from the platform, which is handled by a different contractor, is reportedly processed separately. Nearly 300 kg of waste is reportedly gathered from platforms and track.

The waste, which is collected from the trains, is brought to the collection centre for processing. The collection centre has 13 staff, who are assigned the segregation and processing task. Reportedly, the biodegradable waste, which weighs around 250 kg, is dumped in four aerobic bins set up there and the plastic waste is shredded with a shredding machine. This processed plastic waste is then used for tarring and making PVC pipes, while other waste such as plastic bottles, newspaper, aluminium foil and food plate are mechanically pressurised and packed in bundles by using a bailing machine which is then carried to scrap shops.

That said, reports suggest that the railway has identified an extra space near the station and is waiting to get a sponsorship after which it could establish a new waste processing unit to treat the rest of the wastes.