Despite being one of the busiest corridors of the city with high volumes of traffic, the Tarnaka-Sangeet stretch is also most neglected. Such is the official apathy towards this road that despite years of planning and road widening activities, the stretch lacks uniform width and has many obstacles.
Potholes, transformers and electrical poles standing in the carriageway, crevices that could prove fatal, dishevelled road dividers and bottlenecks; there is no dearth of dangers for an unsuspecting motorist on this stretch. Every time city receives slightest rainfall, this stretch becomes a maze of cesspools to add to the woes of the commuters.
“This stretch is full of dangerous obstacles. Whatever repairs are done are in fits and starts. A smooth motorable carriageway has been missing for years on this road,” B. Chaitanya, a resident of Malkajgiri said.
The sewerage line under the railway bridge too has been overflowing for years causing a break down of the concrete road at this junction repeatedly, he complained. The result is there are traffic jams stretching from Mettuguda during morning hours till the Sangeet junction almost all through the day and night, C. Krishnamurthy, a businessman from Saroornagar said.
Apart from frayed tempers and apparent dangers for the motorists, this stretch is also stretching the endurance of vehicles, he pointed out. With the metro rail works to reach Mettuguda soon, the commuters dread the hardships ahead. Commuters’ problems would not be solved just by re-carpet the road, S. Rajesh Reddy, a commuter, maintained. “There are serious infrastructural problems. The road is littered with bottlenecks effectively reducing the carriageway and authorities should clear them for a long term resolution of the problems,” he added.
Expansion hits roadblock
Uniform expansion of this road stretch has been hanging fire for years due to lack of coordination between GHMC and SCR authorities. The road belongs to R&B but the municipal corporation was entrusted the responsibility of developing the road.
Its efforts to acquire the railway property is pending a hefty land compensation claim demanded by the latter. A High Court appointed high powered team’s judgement is awaited to find a lasting solution.
