Last year, the Chennai Corporation outdid itself. It
made 100 announcements, raising residents’ expectations to a new high
and allowing hope to bloom.

One year on, most of these promises remain unfulfilled, leaving residents frustrated and disappointed.

Announcements
relating to stormwater drains, bridges, roads, parks, playgrounds,
streetlights and pest control, for instance remain mostly on paper or
have been begun but not finished, residents said.

“The
Corporation announced the use of precast technology to complete drains
quickly. Last month, they started digging for drains in some of the
streets in our locality but are delaying the work now. This is causing a
huge inconvenience to residents,” said M. Pushpa, a resident of St.
Xavier Street in Mannady.

Of the estimated total
expenditure of Rs. 2,922.73 crore in 2012-2013, the civic body allocated
a considerable chunk — Rs. 404.53 crore — to the construction of
stormwater drains. But to date, the civic body has completed just 49 km
of precast drains. The deadline for most of the projects has now been
extended by the Corporation Council.

As many as
147.19 km of arterial drains, 229.37 km of feeder drains, and 95.61 km
of collection drains were to be covered in the seven zones of the old
city limits.

In his budget speech last year, Mayor
Saidai Duraisamy announced the re-laying of 1,212 interior roads and 186
new concrete roads, which would be over 380 km in all. So far though,
only 221 km of roads have been re-laid.

Another
unfulfilled promise is the integrated call centre for the helpline 1913,
meant to report civic issues. “We are still not able to report
grievances properly. We have to repeatedly try the number to get
through,” said N. Indirani, a resident of Chintadripet.

In
2012, the construction of seven small bridges was announced. Of these,
work orders for six are yet to be issued. Also, the results of the
feasibility study on seven grade separators have still not been tabled
in the Corporation Council.

“Traffic congestion has
increased considerably because of the improper planning of road
junctions. It takes 20 minutes to cross junctions such as
Sholinganallur, Tidel Park and Porur,” said V. Srinivasan, a resident of
Adyar.

In an attempt to reclaim open spaces and make
the city greener, the Corporation had also announced 100 parks and 50
playgrounds. But so far, work on just 24 playgrounds has been completed
and a mere 23 parks have been readied.

A proposal to
replace all tubelights in the city’s added areas too has fallen flat.
These areas need over 1.1 lakh streetlights. The civic body though, has
installed only 2,000 energy-saving lights and 101 LED lights.

The proposals are good residents say, but with incomplete constructions and endless delays, faith in the civic body is waning.