New drainage line at East Tambaram.

The Tambaram Municipality has started laying pipes as part of stormwater drain work to connect Velachery Main Road in East Tambaram with Selaiyur Lake.

Residents lament that had the work been completed earlier, it would have reduced the problems of inundation in East Tambaram and Selaiyur areas during the monsoon.

The ongoing work for laying concrete pipes of 900-mm diametre from Christ King Girls Higher Secondary School to UCO Bank, East Tambaram, has resulted in traffic going haywire on the arterial Velachery Main Road. Once completed, this will prevent inundation of the area with rain water and sewage at least during the next monsoon, officials hoped.

Residents said there were no traffic policemen to regulate traffic flow on the pothole-ridden stretch. “Not a single day passes off without a traffic snarl on this stretch,” said S. Keerthi, a college student.

“Vehicles get piled up between Sankara Vidyalaya School and Bharatha Matha Street-Velachery Main Road intersection,” she said.

“It takes more than half-an-hour to reach the Tambaram railway station from Camp Road. The work could have been taken up before the monsoon. Traffic on this stretch is crippled during the rush hour every day,” B.V. Saravanan, a resident of Rajakilpakkam, said.

Pedestrians find it difficult to walk because the silt removed from drains is dumped right on the road margins.

Municipal Administration and Water Supply Department officials said they waited for the Highways Department to widen this stretch of the road for a distance of 400 metres.

“Since the Highways Department officials informed us that they had to sort out the compensation package for land acquisition, we have no other option except to lay these pipe-lines for draining out water into Selaiyur Lake through a culvert near Christ King School,” they said.

“This work is being carried out as an emergency measure and Highways Department is coordinating with the municipality,” they added.

Hindu