Metro Rail for IT corridor in Chennai?.

Every day, it takes G. Satish nearly an hour to commute from Semmenchery to Madhya Kailash. This routine tires out commuters like him by the time they get to work.

Though there are hundreds of buses plying on the IT corridor (also known as Rajiv Gandhi Salai or Old Mahabalipuram Road), till Kelambakkam, the roads have become choked over time owing to rapidly-increasing vehicle population.

'If only the government would consider a Metro Rail line along this corridor, travel would become far more comfortable,' says Mr. Satish.

Buses apart, there is no mode of transport for commuters along this stretch. 'Invariably, we are caught in traffic for hours together,' he says.

Lakshmi Narasimhan, secretary of Jeevan Nagar and Thillai Ganga Nagar Association, says it is surprising that one of the fastest growing corridors in the city has not been considered for a Metro Rail network.

'Since one of the corridors of phase-I of Chennai Metro ends at St. Thomas Mount, a line could be extended up to Velachery, where there will be integration with the Mass Rapid Transit System. From there, it could be connected to Kandanchanvadi and up to Kelambakkam. Another option is creating a link from the existing Metro Rail station at Little Mount to Kelambakkam,' he says.

Chennai Metro Rail Limited (CMRL) will soon appoint a consultant to study and suggest other possible corridors where the Metro Rail network can be expanded to.

The IT corridor could certainly do with a Metro Rail network as it has good volume of traffic, says N.S. Srinivasan, former director of National Transportation Planning and Research Centre.

'Merely an independent corridor will not be adequate. It should be integrated with other modes of transport and other corridors. Planning and implementation should be undertaken by various agencies in unison,' he says.

According to some urban planning experts, however, before the Metro Rail is implemented, the bus rapid transit system (BRTS) should be put in place.

Though the State government has considered the possibility of BRTS for the IT corridor, there has been no progress on that front, so far.

In the space of two-three years, and at a fraction of the cost of a rail-based system, a high-quality, high-speed BRTS network can be implemented on the IT corridor, says Christopher Kost of the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP).

'After a few decades, once there is sufficient demand, we could expand the capacity of the corridor by adding a Metro Rail line. A BRTS network would have plenty of capacity in the meantime, and provide faster door-to-door service to commuters,' he says.


THE HINDU