Mumbai, April 30 -- In a bid to upgrade the suburban rail network, Western Railway (WR) is set to convert 17 existing 12-coach local trains into 15-coach services and introduce 12 additional air-conditioned (AC) locals from May 1. Central Railway (CR) will also be upgrading 14 non-AC services to AC on the Harbour line from the same date. WR will enhance its AC network by adding 12 new 12-coach AC services. This will increase the total number of AC services from 133 to 145 on weekdays and from 106 to 118 on weekends, officials said. On the CR network, the total number of AC services will reach 108. "In line with passenger's demand, we will upgrade 14 Non-AC services to AC on CSMT-Panvel Harbour line with effect from May 1. The total includes 28 services on Harbour line and 80 services on Main line," said a CR official. Alongside this, capacity expansion too is being undertaken. On the Western line, the number of 15-coach trains will rise from 227 to 244. In a first, eight of the 15-car trains will run on the Virar-Dahanu Road section, a rapidly growing stretch that sees an average daily footfall of around 1.25 lakh commuters. Despite the upgrades, the total number of suburban services on Central Railway will remain unchanged at 1,820. shashank rao...