[1]Prepaid call taxi driver Chandran has been filling an extra litre of petrol in his car of late. Not because of better patronage, but the additional waiting time at Chennai Central. The case is no different with other cab and autorickshaws drivers.
Like drivers, commuters frequenting Chennai Central station also take a lot of time to move in and out of been spending additional time trying to get in and out of the station because of the metro rail work that has eaten up more than half of the road space.
As many as five-six lakh people everyday visit the Chennai Central station premises, including the Moore Market EMU complex, which sometimes has four lakh visitors.
GRP officials point out that not less than 1,000 two wheelers and 3,000 four wheelers enter the station premises.
The number of vehicles at Chennai Central appears to increase every day, but the road space has reduced by 50 per cent because of the ongoing metro rail work, officials said.
“We opened one passage of the parking lot and removed parking on the pavement to ease vehicle flow, but the traffic bottleneck continues to haunt us,” complained a GRP official, adding that sometimes a blockade in the car park leads to a bottleneck till the entrance of the station at the GM office end.
GRP officials said that people were cooperative and obey signals and diversions at Central. It is now left to the metro rail authorities to expedite the work or take up work stage by stage to ease the traffic congestion at Central, said a GRP official, adding that the road was too narrow to regulate traffic at the place where the maximum people congregate daily.
The authorities could have taken up the work in phases there or made better stopgap arrangements. It takes not less than 15 minutes to enter Central through the Victoria Hall entrance and come out after dropping someone there,” said M. Kannan, a regular traveler between Chennai and Erode.
Police personnel have appealed to individual commuters to avoid entering the premises on SUVs and MUVs, which occupy a lot of space, to help regulate traffic better.
Clutter collects on busy road
Motorists and commuters are increasingly getting exasperated with the pathetic condition of the Jawaharlal Nehru Salai.
Stretches here have become uneven and dangerous after the barricades that had been set up for Metro Rail works have been removed.
The stretch from Jafferkhanpet to Kathipara has become unusable due to potholes and dust. And two-wheeler riders have a particularly bad time.
Road users had a tough time even when the barricades had been put up as there were very few intersections to cross over.
But, now that the Metro Rail works have been completed in the Jawaharlal Nehru Salai, the barricades have been removed, leaving gaping holes in the road.
“There are deep holes in the centre of the entire stretch and the road is very uneven. While one portion is high, it suddenly dips on the other side and makes riding very difficult,” said one motorist.
Moreover, the debris collected in the centre of the road is never cleaned and garbage piles up on the streets after it rains.
As the roads have not been not re-laid, clouds of dust rise during peak hours and result in poor visibility for two-wheeler users.
When contacted, a source in the Highways department said, “Of the 7.5 km stretch along which Metro Rail work is in progress, Chennai Metro Rail Ltd has handed over 2.5 km between Koyembedu and Ashok Nagar to re-lay the roads. They have also agreed to pay to re-lay part of the roads. The work will be taken up after the August 15.”
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[1] http://archive.asianage.com/07metro-rail-workjpgcropdisplayjpg-938