Senior officials of the Tiruchi Railway Division held discussions with officials of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) here on Tuesday regarding the closure of the access route to the Golden Rock via G.Corner in the city following the four-laning of the Tiruchi-Chennai Bypass.
Divisional Railway Manager S.Subramhanyan, P.Meenakshi, Project Director, NHAI, Tiruchi, senior officials of the Golden Rock Central Railway Workshop, the highway project consultant and project concessionaire participated in the discussions.
With the closure of the main entry point from the city to the Golden Rock, vehicles proceeding from TVS Tollgate can not enter Golden Rock from the Bypass. Motorists can no longer cross over the highway.
Instead they have to take a detour of about two kilometres to go up to Senthaneerpuram, crossing over the new Bypass bridge, to take a U-turn and return to enter the Golden Rock main road from the left. Otherwise, they have to go via the Pudukottai Highway to join the Ponmalaipatti Road which makes for a detour of more than four km. According to sources, Mr.Subramhanyan urged the NHAI to restore the “right of way” to the Golden Rock from the Bypass. Building a vehicular underpass at the junction was discussed at the meeting. NHAI officials responded by asking the Railways to give their request in writing so that they could forward it to their headquarters.
Prior to the four-laning of this particular stretch, the project consultant was said to have mooted the construction of an underpass at the junction but had asked the Railways to pay Rs.1 crore and give about 3,000 square metres of land for the purpose. The proposal failed to materialise.
