But it showers misery on road users

Madurai: With monsoon come the miseries. The North-East monsoon has only arrived at the state on Thursday with a few hours of thundershowers, but the city roads are already taking a beating of the rain fury.

The first spell of the rain, which lashed many parts of the Madurai city, has flooded the pothole-riddled city roads, making them unmotorable for users and exposing the tall claims by the corporation officials about the monsoon preparedness.

The city roads were already in state of disrepair following the recent spell of rainfalls, but the corporation officials left them unrepaired, citing that repairing roads would be a futile task when the rain continues to pour down.

However, the potholes which were not that deep a month ago have become deeper in many parts of the city, posing a threat to many of the road users.

The stretch between Melamadai signal and PC Perungayam, on the ring road, has become so damaged that two vehicles had a close shave while attempting to evade a huge pothole on Thursday.

Further, the unscientific way the medians have been constructed means that when it raisn the one side of the road near the Vandiyur tank gets inundated, much like the road opposite to the bus stop where knee-deep water stagnated on Thursday.

“This road has developed long, deep holes making two-wheeler riding a real uphill task,’’ said K Shankar, who had a narrow escape.

Almost all the roads have been riddled with potholes, including those in Tallakulam, Race Course Road, Villapuram, Jakka Thoppu, Kamarajar Salai among others. “Potholes are creating traffic snarl-ups in most parts of the city. It also leads to accidents,’’ said K Ganeshan of K Pudur.

A lot of bikers have fallen off their vehicle while travelling along the roads following Thursday’s rain. A Asokan, district secretary of the Makkal Sakthi Iyakkam, said the corporation could not say that they did not have fund for repair.

“They have collected nearly Rs 25,000 from a building owner for a single water pipeline connection. This happened when the owner building himself spent the money on laying the pipes. Where has all that money gone?” he asked.

Madurai corporation commissioner Aneesh Sekhar said that the engineers were asked to assess the condition of the roads in their regions. They were told to fill up the bigger potholes with wet mix macadam (WMM).

“Filling the potholes with bitumen as the rain continue would not be a good idea, but the potholes would be given immediate attention,’’ said the Madurai corporation commissioner.