Express trains in India

Superfast Express trains are express trains which make still fewer stops, as compared to ordinary express trains, achieving still shorter journey times. Tickets cost more than ordinary express trains as they have "superfast surcharge" added to them. Trains with an average speed, excluding halts, equaling or exceeding 55 kilometres per hour (34 mph) (60 kilometres per hour (37 mph) until the early 1990s) on both up and down journeys fall into this category and are numbered with a prefix of 12 or 22 or 20 (previously 2). Including halts the average speed often is below 55 km/h. In some cases, trains run superfast where there is an overlapping express service available, and run regular express trains where there is no supplementary express service.

As of 2015, 450 pairs of superfast trains ran on the Indian Railways. The 12394/Sampoorna Kranti Express (RJPB/Rajender Nagar Terminal–Ndls/New Delhi) is the fastest non-Shatabdi, non-Rajdhani train in India.

Mail trains are trains which earlier exclusively had mail coaches. Nowadays, all the trains in the country including mail trains carry mail in luggage coach itself, but the train branding remains in use.

WDP-4 loco hauling Rajdhani Express

The trains are hauled by most-powerful locomotives in the country, such as WDP-4D or WAP-7, each with an output of more than 4,000 hp.

Shatabdi Express LHB coaches at Mysore station

The coaches in these trains are of crash-worthy design from Alstom-LHB, built by Rail Coach Factory, Kapurthala.[2][3] These Alstom-LHB coaches can be pulled to a speed of 160 km/h without any modification.[4] New express coaches are made partly or completely of stainless steel, primarily motivated by lower maintenance, and higher availability. Stainless steel construction also reduces empty weight, enabling more passengers per coach.[5] The bogies, design from Fiat, have two disk brakes per axle[4] essential for safe operations especially at the speed of fast-express trains.

The trains run on nationwide Indian gauge. They run on tracks with classifications Group A, permitting speed up to 160 km/h, and Group B for speed up to 130 km/h. Lower speed limits apply when they are on tracks or railway switches, which have lower speed limits. The design of the railway switches, with a speed limit of 50–90 km/h, is the major bottleneck to higher speed.[6] Another constraint is the need to accommodate freight trains at the current top speed of 70 km/h.[7] These constraints to speed are consequences of sharing tracks with freight and lower speed suburban passenger trains.

Train stops reduce the average running speed of a train by preventing it from gaining higher speed. The distance between stops is as short as 2 km between New Bongaigaon-Bongaigaon on the Howrah–Dibrugarh Kamrup Express, and as long as 528 km between Vadodara–Kota on the Thiruvananthapuram Rajdhani Express.

Indian railways run non-reserved trains under the brand Jan Sadharan Express and Antyodaya Express. These trains have all Unreserved/General coaches.[8]

Apart from Antyodaya and Jan Sadharan trains, unreserved/general coaches are also present in express trains. A new series of Deen Dayalu coaches has also been proposed for long-distance trains. The Deen Dayalu coaches will be more comfortable than the existing old coaches.[9]

The average speed of trains, range from 36 kilometres per hour (22 mph) to 113 kilometres per hour (70 mph). Of this, counting up and down trains separately, 23 trains have an average speed more than 80 km/h, whereas 72 trains have an average speed between 70 and 80 km/h. The speed of express trains is calculated from the latest Indian Railways timetable.

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  13351 Bokaro Express
• 
  18237 Chhattisgarh Express
• 
  A WAP 5 hauled Gatimaan express
• 
  Humsafar Express
• 
  Hyderabad - Jaipur Express
• 
  Mastyagandha Express
• 
  12451/52 VVIP Shram Shakti Express

• High-speed rail in India
• MEMU
• Slow and fast passenger trains in India
• Suburban trains

• List of All Express and Mail Trains
• List of All Superfast Trains