Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Who goes over?

When this flyover was being built, I'd hazarded the premise that the traffic around Panagal Park on Usman Road has thinned out. A couple of days ago, I was walking down that road to take a look at the completed flyover, which was inaugurated on August 14. I noticed a decent-sized traffic jam, the very thing that the flyover was expected to minimize. The reason? Many vehicles were skirting the flyover and several of them were pausing to let people off in front of the GRT showroom. Those that weren't interested in GRT's jewellery were possibly looking at going to the shops just beyond, and on Prakasam Road; there were others making a U-turn under the flyover to get at some other shops. I guess the story was very much the same at the other end of the flyover, for there was little traffic coming down it, too.

I am sure there will be several explanations for the flyover not being used. Maybe people didn't know that the flyover is open for traffic; maybe they thought it was operating only one-way. Possibly, the weekend traffic does not need to use the flyover. Once the pavement shops are relocated, people will not need to crowd under the flyover. Whatever explanations are offered, I hope that none of them tries to claim it was unnecessary to have a flyover there!

8 comments:

LVISS said...

The flyover looks beautiful in the night.
I think they are still to decide how to route the traffic near the bridge. As usual our people take to shortcuts within shortcuts. A few days back I went under the bridge to fing people jay walking between vehicles stopping their smooth flow.

magiceye said...

strange! we would never leave any road over or under vacant in mumbai!

Harry Makertia said...

Wow interesting, Chennai people are very polite! I wish we have this kind of situation here in Bandung! :)

Shantaram said...

>> Ravindran>> I guess you are right about the traffic. You're definitely right about the sight!

>> Deepak>> Neither would the Madrasi, normally. That's what makes the whole thing very intriguing.

>> Harry>> Hahaha! Maybe we are slightly risk-averse... what if the flyover is not completely load tested yet.... ?? :D

Anonymous said...

i too had a bad experience from the other side, it bottle necks from the CIT nagar and takes quite a while to reach the bridge.

Shantaram said...

>> Ram>> I guess all good things take time to grow... by then this flyover would be outgrown!

sanil said...

Have to confess that I had lost track of your posts for a while. Am planning to re-start following it, starting from this post about bridge in T Nagar which I had read last. Have a lot of catching up to do though;)

Shantaram said...

@ Sanil: You've almost a year's catching up to do - lucky you ;)