By coming up with a comprehensive city map, Travel Club Madurai has made it easier for travellers to navigate the temple town. The handy fan-fold map offers crisp information on various aspects of the city from the popular tourist attractions to lesser known pockets, places to eat and things to buy and contacts of hotels and destinations. How good is the idea of a hand map in the digital era? “Though the internet offers information at the click of a button, it's too much of a pile for any discerning traveller. There's need for selected and relevant information and we have tried to accommodate the best of research in the guide,” says Rishwanth Jayaraj, the club treasurer. “I travelled to Germany last year and was surprised to see maps for all kinds of activities, from something as simple as taking a train to going for a walk.”
The Travel Club members took inspiration from a map designed for a Calcutta Walk, an activity for tourists. “Madurai’s need for such map was overdue given the number of tourists who visit the city daily,” says Jayaraj. Cartographer Samit Roychoudhury who has the distinction of designing map for the Indian Railways, called as The Great Indian Railway Atlas, was invited to draw the Madurai map. “He stayed in the city for a couple of days to understand the topography, culture and the essence of the place.”
“The existing maps for Madurai are just road maps that give directions. Useful information for the tourists is missing,” says Dr. G Vasudevan, a founding member of Travel Club. “This is a maiden attempt, which has to be refined subsequently.” He adds, “When people think of Madurai, they only think of temples whereas there's much more to the region. For instance, in Thoothukudi and Rameswaram, a pilgrim town, water sports are coming up along the coast. We want to popularise attraction across southern Tamil Nadu, like what can be done in Dindigul or Karaikudi.” In a bid to promote the entire Madurai region, Travel Club has also launched a website www.travelclubmadurai.com that offers all kinds of details on nearby places of interest like Chettinad, Munnar and Palani.
“In future, we also plan to design a calender of festivals, on the lines of Kerala. If we are able to chalk out the dates and venues of various festivals in the region for the next couple of years and provide it in the form of a calender for tourists, it will be easier for people to plan,” says Vasudevan. “Festivals like the Chithirai tiruvizha, Jallikattu and Pongal need to be popularised, as travellers don't want to see just monuments these days, but experience the life and culture of a place.”
The Madurai city map will be placed at the airport, railway station and hotels for tourists free of cost.
