In these places near airport, life is a crawl

Chennai: Swanky gated communities, schools, and hospitals have come up over the past 20 years at Pallavaram and areas around it. Many professionals bought houses there to be close to the airport, which is just a km to the south. But getting there can be an ordeal. The Pallavam-Kundrathur Road and Tiruneermalai Main Road, both state highways that pass through the locality that is home to more than seven lakh people, can break the axles of cars and leave people with herniated discs.

This is a sharp contrast to the situation on the other side of GST road. Hemashree D, a techie, says it takes her 45 minutes on her two-wheeler to travel 4.5km from Anakaputhur to Pallavaram at 8 am. But the 10km onward journey from Pallavaram via the Radial Road to her office in Thoraipakkam takes less than 30 minutes. “While I can leave home at 7 am to beat the traffic, I am stranded in the evenings,” she said. The only alternative route for Hemashee is to take the Tiruneermalai Main Road to reach her Anakaputhur home. “But that road is equally bad. It also has too many potholes and does not have adequate streetlights,” she said.

A cocktail of chronic mismanagement, neglect, heavy traffic, and the recent rain has made travel on these two state highways a nightmare. “ Many residents here pay a high rent or buy expensive apartments to live close to the airport,” said Anakaputhur resident S Balaji. More apartments and gated communities are coming up in Pammal, Pallavaram, and Pozhichalur. “But these two roads badly need to be expanded and re-laid,” he said.

When an MTC bus stops for commuters, vehicles pile up on the road. Two-wheeler riders attempt to manoeuvre between sand lorries as cab drivers honk impatiently. “Outside Tasmac outlets, people drink on the road and harass pedestrians. There are no cops. We see near collisions almost every day,” said Pon Kumar of Pozhichalur.

The State Highways Department’s proposal to widen the Pallavaram-Anakaputhur roads has not seen any progress because of two reasons -- encroachments by shops and issues in land acquisition. The width of the seven-metre Pallavaram-Anakaputhur road will increase to 23 metres after the expansion. Tambaram mayor K Vasanthakumari said “Eviction notices have already been issued to encroaching shops. If they ignore the notices, we will be forced to demolish these buildings for road widening," she said.

Meanwhile, the acquisition on Pallavaram-Kundrathur road by the revenue department is in different stages, a senior official from the highways department said. The state plans a fourth arm of the Tiruneermalai flyover will descend at the Chennai-Maduravoyal by-pass. “This proposal will come as a relief to people in Pammal, Pozhichalur, Anakaputhur, Nagalkeni and Tiruneermalai,” the official said.

Octogenarian activist V Santhanam says “We have been hearing the same excuses for two decades now. Now, we just need better roads.”