The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : What blocks the use of these stones as medians?

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Wednesday, Jul 09, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

What blocks the use of these stones as medians?

Special Correspondent

Concrete blocks of Highways Department lying idle

— Photo :K. Manikandan

FOR WHOM THEY WAIT?: Concrete stones that could be used as temporary medians on roads have been lying idle inside Madras Christian College in Tambaram for more than a year.

TAMBARAM: A few hundred concrete blocks belonging to the State Highways Department and meant for use as temporary medians on some of the arterial roads in the southern suburbs of Chennai have been lying idle inside Madras Christian College in Tambaram for about 18 months now.

As President, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam visited the MCC in East Tambaram and Madras Institute of Technology in Chromepet on February 23 last year. As part of the visit, concrete blocks, called “pre-cast cement concrete kerbs” in official parlance, were placed on the Velachery Main Road near the college and also inside the institution’s premises as part of certain traffic regulation measures and to prevent movement of vehicles in some spots.

However, soon after the function got over, the few hundred blocks of concrete were lined up in a corner near the college main gate and they continue to remain there. Senior officials of the traffic police are unable to use the concrete blocks for any purpose. A spokesperson for the college said the issue would be examined and sorted out, while traffic policemen said they needed it at the earliest to plug some of the breaches in the existing medians along Velachery Main Road between East Tambaram and Medavakkam.

Installing steel barricades was slightly expensive and these concrete blocks could be placed and shifted easily from one spot to another.

Enquiries with engineers of Chennai City Roads Division, under whose control the Velachery Main Road comes, revealed that the issue was not brought to their attention. They were aware of the problems of the gaps in medians and also the requirement of a large volume of temporary structures in the form of pre-cast concrete blocks and steel barricades. If a formal request was sent to them to remove the blocks from the institution for use elsewhere, arrangements would be made immediately they said.

A senior engineer of the State Highways Department said a proposal to construct permanent raised medians for a five-km distance from Medavakkam towards Tambaram was cleared and work expected to begin shortly.

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