Urban News

The Hindu 20.08.2009

Foot overbridge work in Saidapet soon

Deepa H Ramakrishnan

— Photo: S.S.Kumar

DIRE NEED: Both pedestrians and motorists will benefit from the proposed FOB.

CHENNAI: Work on construction of a foot overbridge on the busy Taluk Office Road in Saidapet will commence within a few days with the Chennai Corporation issuing the work orders to the contractor.

The facility will come up near the Saidapet Court, said a senior official of the civic body. The FOB would be constructed at an estimated cost of Rs.31 lakh. It would also have elevators on both sides. The work for installing elevators at an estimated cost of Rs.55 lakh is in the tendering stage. When the FOB was completed, work on the elevators would be taken up.

After the traffic police introduced one-way regulation on Taluk Office Road over two year ago, pedestrians demanded a foot overbridge. Then, the Corporation had announced that it would install an escalator there.

The proposed FOB would come as a blessing to pedestrians. “As there is no traffic signal at the spot, vehicles coming from the Saidapet bridge and Guindy tend to run at more speed in this area. Though a traffic constable is posted here during rush hour, many people find it difficult to cross the road at other times,” said T.Thirumal, an advocate at the Saidapet Court.

Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) M. Shakeel Akhter said the traffic police had suggested that such facilities be installed in places on priority basis. “In many places such as near Shastri Bhavan and on Rajiv Gandhi Salai, the FOBs are not used. Pedestrians still prefer to walk across the road. On an experimental basis they are trying out an FOB with lifts in Nungambakkam. We will see the success rate of these FOBs [Nungambakkam and Saidapet] and suggest more in other places.”

The Hindu 20.08.2009

MTC to add 100 new AC buses

Vidya Venkat

CHENNAI: The Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) will be adding 100 new air-conditioned Volvo buses to its fleet in a few months.

Senior officials of the transport corporation said with this they will be able to improve the frequency of AC bus services in existing routes and launch services in new routes.

“As of now the air-conditioned buses are mostly seen running virtually empty in many of the routes. The patronage is not enough,” a senior official conceded.

“We are exploring options with regards to new AC bus routes. A study is under way to see which routes will bring good patronage for these luxury services. We will mostly expand these services to the nearby district headquarters,” the official said.

Senior officials added that as of now air-conditioned buses plying to Kancheepuram enjoyed good patronage and they would continue to operate these services only in longer routes.

They said 900 other semi-low floor vehicles will also be added to the existing fleet in another few months.

Shankar Narayanan, a BPO employee who regularly travels in the AC bus service A1 to Thiruvanmiyur, said he found that many passengers were reluctant to travel in these services as the tickets were highly priced.

“If the MTC augments these services, they should also explore options like providing monthly travel cards exclusively for these services. They can also explore options like running special services during office hours in commercial zones of the city,” he said.

Buses to MRTS stations

Meanwhile, the MTC has recently started operating some of its regular services through the Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS) stations in Light House and Chintadripet.

A few months ago, it extended some buses that used to terminate at Vijay Nagar terminus to the Velachery MRTS station.

A senior official of MTC said that the recent move to link its services to two more MRTS stations is part of the initiative to create inter-modal transport system.

He added that though it had been about a week since the buses were operated through the Light House and Chintadripet stations, the response was poor.