The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Pallavaram subway to open in August

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jul 06, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Pallavaram subway to open in August

Staff Reporter

Work held up due to land allocation issues

FACILITY GETTING READY: The pedestrian subway being built at Pallavaram by the NHAI. PHOTO: A. Muralitharan

TAMBARAM: The pedestrian subway in Pallavaram will be opened to the public in the middle of August.

Work on three subways at Alandur, Tambaram and Pallavaram commenced almost simultaneously in early 2005.

While the subways at Alandur and Tambaram are under use, the one at Pallavaram got into problems because of a tussle between the Pallavaram Municipality and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) over land allocation.

Flight of steps

The NHAI placed the concrete boxes and even completed the flight of steps on the western end on land belonging to the St. Thomas Mount cum Pallavaram Cantonment Board.

But the staircase on the eastern end of the subway could not be completed as that land belonged to the Pallavaram Municipality.

Problems sorted out

The problems were sorted out but not before exchange of charges and counter charges between the local body and the central government agency, and work resumed last month.

Now, work is on to complete the staircase on the eastern end which would be done by the middle of August, officials said.

The subway at Pallavaram, like the ones at Tambaram and Alandur, is being built using box-pushing techniques where road cutting is done away with.

Concrete boxes are made at the construction site and pushed into place using hydraulic power.

The subway, including the staircase, is 31 metres long and the boxes alone are 17 metres long.

The cost of the sub-way project is around Rs. 2.48 crore.

Though the construction of the staircase on the eastern side did not need land acquisition, it has reduced the width of the road.

Enough space

However, officials said they had left enough space for vehicles, including four-wheelers, to use the Station Road.

The subway would benefit thousands of pedestrians who wait for a long time to cross the Grand Southern Trunk Road to reach the Pallavaram bus stand on one side and the railway station on the other.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Tamil Nadu