A Metro ride all the way to airport

A sneak peek into what commuters can expect from the eagerly awaited service from Little Mount

At half past eleven, as Poonamallee High Road bustles with traffic, a Chennai Metro Rail train departs from Koyambedu station with a few hundred passengers. In about 15 minutes, it reaches Alandur, disgorges them and gets ready for the next ride, back to its origin station.

But one level below, in the same station, a brand new train has arrived, ready to head to Little Mount. Every day, about 4-5 trains are put through trials from Little Mount to Chennai airport, a distance of 9 km, a service that will soon be open to the public.

Less than 10 minutes after leaving Alandur, the train enters the Little Mount station that is equipped with almost every passenger facility required. To help commuters — even those not travelling by the Metro — there are foot overbridges specially constructed for them to get to the other side of the road. But since it is a rather narrow stretch, it is not clear if many would even resort to using this facility; a pedestrian crossing would have helped.

Back at the station, a new train, heading to Chennai airport, waits at the platform and within minutes, heads out.

Changing trains

While it is a direct ride to Chennai airport for those travelling from Little Mount, commuters boarding at Koyambedu will have to change trains at Alandur; this may be an arduous affair for those with baggage unless there is a train every 5-7 minutes.

And just beyond Officers’ Training Academy when the train breaks into a tunnel, the view on the right gets spectacular with flights taking off and arriving on the runway.

The tunnel was specially built for about 1.5 km from Nanganallur to a little beyond Meenambakkam for safety reasons. In about 15 minutes, the train reaches the swanky airport station which is a huge six-storey structure with two parking levels, street level, concourse level, a floor for airport utilities and finally, the platform level. This may be a sprawling, elegant structure but it suffers in terms of connectivity as there is no travellator yet in place linking the station with the airport terminals. It may be a long walk for commuters with baggage to get to the terminals.

Except for minor works, all stations in the stretch from Little Mount to Chennai airport are nearly complete. Six years now and commuters still wait in anticipation to see take this ride to airport.