Shrinking India: Visualizing time-space implication of introduction of semi-high-speed trains in India

Indian Railways have been the largest people moving transport infrastructure in India. Over the years the systems and trains have been upgraded resulting in both better passenger amenities and reduction in travel time. The newest addition is the Vande Bharat Express, a semi-high-speed train that was introduced in India in 2019. The train currently runs between 10 routes and has brought significant changes to India’s railway network. This article explores the introduction of Vande Bharat Express trains in India and its effects on the country’s inter-station time-space shrinkage using cartographic techniques. The cartographic techniques like stepwise multi-dimensional scaling and interpolation using the distance cartogram plugin in QGIS are mainly used for generating the time-space maps for various speeds. The limitations of these techniques and the methods to overcome those limitations are also explored in this article.