Where pedestrians are out on a limb

Lack of signals makes three junctions extremely risky for this section of road users.

April 18, 2015 08:00 pm | Updated 08:00 pm IST

Pedestrians find it difficult to cross the Kilpauk Garden Road near Cemetery. Photo: K. Pichumani

Pedestrians find it difficult to cross the Kilpauk Garden Road near Cemetery. Photo: K. Pichumani

Purasawalkam High Road

What Ranganathan Street is to south Chennai, Purasawalkam High (PH) Road is to north Chennai. If you haven’t already guessed it, both draw shoppers.

The shops on PH Road benefit the residents of Purasawalkam, Ayanavaram and Vepery the most.

The regular shoppers from these areas and beyond complain of one thing: Continuous flow of vehicular traffic from Kellys and Kilpauk into PH Road makes it difficult for them to cross the 60-feet stretch and reach the shops.

Pavements are inaccessible as they are encroached upon by hawkers or by shopkeepers who eat up the space on the footpath to keep their goods. This problem is intense on the stretch between PH Road–Millers Road junction and Doveton, as it is considerably narrow due to encroachments including illegal parking. This, despite the fact that this stretch is one-way. “Young pedestrians dash across the road and senior citizens have to wait until autorickshaw drivers or policemen stop the traffic for a minute,” says K. Seethalakshmi, a resident of Purasawalkam.

Millers Road

The one-km-stretch is an important link road that connects Purasawalkam High (PH) Road to the rest of the city, especially the central and southern parts, via the Pooonamallee High Road.

The PH Road–Millers Road junction is where a row of textile showrooms begins. . “Pedestrian crossing is needed at least at the junction as Ormes Road, Barnaby Road, Dr. Alagappa Chetty Road and Flowers Road intersect at the Millers Road in front of the Dev Darshan Apartment complex. School children and elders find it difficult to cross the junction throughout the day as vehicles going to PH Road keep pouring in,” said S. Nishant, a resident of Purasawalkam.

Kilpauk Garden Road

Except for Chintamani junction, none of the junctions on Kilpauk Garden Road has a pedestrian crossing.

On these junctions, pedestrians have to risk themselves while crossing important traffic points like the small roundtana at Pulla Avenue Road, near the Kilpauk Cemetery and New Avadi Road junction. According to the police, the stretch is less congested compared to PH Road and Poonamallee High Road as it does not have a profusion of commercial establishments.

However, the stretch has a large number of clinics and hospitals. “Due to the ongoing Metro Rail work on Poonamalle High Road, the Kilpauk Garden Road is used to reach the western and north-western parts of the city.

The flow of vehicles, especially two-wheelers, have increased in the last few years,” said G. Suganth, a resident of Kilpauk.

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