Dedicated Freight Corridor:

Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) is a railway route, which is dedicated to freight (goods and commodity) traffic movement only. Two dedicated freight corridors, Dadri to Jawaharlal Nehru Port (western DFC) and Ludhiana to Son Nagar (eastern DFC) are currently under construction.

Advantages of DFCs:

• Reduce unit cost of transportation by speeding up freight train operations & higher productivity
  
  
• Increase rail share in freight market by providing customized logistic services
  
  
• Segregate freight infrastructure for focused approach on both passenger and freight business of Railways
  
  
• Create additional rail infrastructure to cater high levels of transport demand
  
  
• Introduce of high-end technology & IT packing of Freight Services
  
  
• Introduce time tabled freight services & guaranteed transit time
  
  

Dedicated Passenger Corridor:

• These are dedicated corridors for fast moving trains. On these routes, the train speed would be increased to above 160 kilometres per hour (kmph) over the next four or five years by revamping the entire signalling, tracks and fencing.
  
  

Advantages of DPC:

• Lower Cost: The project would cost much lower than for a DFC as the track standards required for passenger movement would be as obtaining on the Indian Railways (IR) system at present.
  
  
• Increase in Profit: Shifting of passenger services to DPC would generate capacity for freight services on IR’s existing network and leave room for future growth in demand. Consequently, profits would increase.
  
  
• Punctuality: With the DPC, the level of punctuality of passenger trains would be higher than at present.
  
  
• Planning new services: Overnight services between major metros and fast intercity connections for medium distances can be planned.
  
  
• New avenues: It may be possible to exploit the real estate potential of the new and existing terminals and also to offer trains on a franchise to operators who would pay an “access charge” to IR or the company owning the DPC. It could also be used for running time-tabled super-fast parcel services and high-value consignments like cars and other consumer durables between important urban centres.
  
  
• Higher revenue: With better service quality and savings in time, the customers would also be willing to pay more, hence revenue could be higher
  
  
• Environment friendly: In addition to all the above advantages, these routes will also divert lot of traffic from road to rail, thereby providing enormous savings in fuel costs to the economy and reducing pollution.