A 3-km long elevated corridor from Ambattur Industrial Estate to Pattaravakkam railway station, the first of its kind in Tamil Nadu, has been completed but will be thrown open to traffic only a year from now.

This is because the laying of the 13km road from Maduravoyal to Madhavaram and the construction of a rail overbridge in Pattaravakkam are expected to be completed only by June next year.

According to officials, while the road-laying work is progressing, the construction of the rail overbridge will begin only after the design is approved by the railways. The elevated corridor is part of Phase II of the Rs. 405crore 32km Chennai bypass project from Tambaram to Madhavaram via Maduravoyal, which will interlink all the four national highways starting from the city. The 19km first phase of the project, which consists of the road from Tambaram to Maduravoyal, was completed in April last year. Work on the second phase, from Maduravoyal to Madhavaram via Ambattur, Pattaravakkam, Menambedu and Kathirvedu, is in progress. The project should have been completed in 2007, but land acquisition and rains in the last three years have delayed the project.

(Courtesy: Anna Nagar Times)