To send letter to CM asking legislators to get a taste of public transport in city
A group of commuters from Kovilambakkam Panchayat have prepared a letter to send to Chief Minister Jayalalithaa requesting her to make her legislators travel by bus in order to understand the problems commuters face. Their complaints deal with poor bus connectivity and unclean buses.
A total of 18 residents of Rajam Nagar and Sadasivam Avenue in Kovilambakkam Panchayat have prepared the signed resolution.
“Two routes — A-51 connecting Broadway and Tambaram and 5-A connecting T. Nagar and Tambaram pass via Velachery. But they do not halt on Gandhi Road which has over 1,000 commuters,” said Kasi Raju, a bus commuter.
He said though students in the locality have been given free bus passes, they are not able to use them as buses do not stop on Velachery Gandhi Road.
“Many of them pay Rs.10 and have to travel to the Vijaya Nagar terminus in private jeeps to take a bus to their schools, making it a longer, more arduous journey. They have been severely inconvenienced because of this for several years now, as time and money is wasted on travel,” he said.
Though the commuters have sent many petitions to the State government as well as to Metropolitan Transport Corporation Limited (MTC), they have had no response. “Deluxe buses to Thiruvanmiyur stop on Velachery Gandhi Road. But none going towards Tambaram stop here,” said Vimala Sasikumar, who travels to Tambaram daily.
Commuters said that only if a legislator travelled by public transport would he know what the actual problems were. “They can then convey our issues to the government and that will lead to better governance,” said residents in the resolution.
The residents also plan to meet the Chief Minister sometime soon.
Connectivity apart, another issue that irks commuters is the poor condition of the buses.
“Most buses are unclean with litter strewn around. Doors do not function in the deluxe buses. They are not really deluxe in terms of convenience,” said S. Kalitheerthan, a commuter who works in an IT company on Old Mahabalipuram Road.
Keywords: Chennai transit, Chennai buses, commuting, MTC
I was re-reading this post and I felt like I need to record my view
here.As stated in the news the commuters feel the pain of not able to
board the bus at Gandhi Road. As a resident of Velachery I feel the pain
but also want to state that the velachery main road is too narrow at most
of the places. Gandhi Road is one such place and if we allow all the
buses to stop at this bus stop we will end up piling big traffic both
ways Further, When I was in school the bus stop at Gandhi Road was near
Dandeeswaram Tank, then they moved near IIT entrance on Velachery Road
(Buses Bound Tambaram). This is an acute problem but in-order to find
solution to this problem we people need to unite and try pushing for
clearing the encroachments along the road. There is a Cycle Shop right at
the intersection of Velachery Main Road and Gandhi Road which occupy part
of the raod and there are shops right next to the temple. These need to
addressed first for an amicable solution for everybody.
An excellent point by Vijay. If we, as citizens, keep our place/city clean by not littering, spitting, etc., certain basic things would already be taken care of. As mentioned by Vijay, the buses start even before 5 am; there is no regular maintenance time for cleaning, maintenance, etc. At least, we could do our bit by not only avoiding littering or tearing seats in buses but also avoid throwing filth, dirt, plastic, etc. on roads. Here is a sample: in Ashtalakshmi Nagar 3rd main road, Alappakkam, open areas are converted into waste dumpyards by citizens. Plastic bags and bottles thrown by residents/miscreants block SWD, and sewerage or dirty water overflows from them onto the roads everyday. If very heavy rains come, it gets mixed with rainwater and then? Chaos. We have seen the worst in our area. This occurs in many localities in Madras. Let us hope that citizens cooperate with Govt. agencies, and Corporation, in turn, takes measures to remove blockage in the SWD.
entirely agree with Vijay .. why litter the bus and then complain it
is not clean .. this is the same with local trains also .. in a first
class compartment a gentleman has made it a habit to eat variety of
biscuits and wash it down with water packets .. he will push the
wrapper and sache swiftly under the seat .. when questioned his answer
is railways will clean it .. this is the attitude .. in marina it is a
worst scenerio .. a group of well dressed people (NRI's from Toronto)
were enjoying their sweet corns and after finshing they casually throw
the left-overs on the sand .. perfectly tuned to chennai culture ..
this is the gratitude we show to our mother earth .. The Govt. on its
part must implement stern measures and penalize the culprits who
litter in public places, spit pawn-parag .. The govt. can earn in
crores by way of imposing fines inline with Maharashtra ..
entirely agree with Vijay .. why litter the bus and then complain it
is not clean .. this is the same with local trains also .. in a first
class compartment a gentleman has made it a habit to eat variety of
biscuits and wash it down with water packets .. he will push the
wrapper and sache swiftly under the seat .. when questioned his answer
is railways will clean it .. this is the attitude .. in marina it is a
worst scenerio .. a group of well dressed people (NRI's from Toronto)
were enjoying their sweet corns and after finshing they casually
through the left-overs on the sand .. perfectly tuned to chennai
culture .. this is the gratitude we show to our mother earth .. The
Govt. on its part must implement stern measures and penalize the
culprits who litter in public places, spit pawn-parag .. The govt. can
earn in crores by way of imposing fines inline with Maharashtra ..
Maintenance of MTC buses are long time issue and this need to be addressed on a regular basis. And also MTC has to review the stoppages of services in such a way that from any bus stop, it should have the connectity to anywhere if services are available from there. I would also request MTC to provide stoppages for all the services for the junction points. In particular, Gurunanak College of Velacherry, Maduvinkarai of Guindy, Axis Bank of Madipakkam are some of the points where few of the servies only having stoppages.
Kudos to the protesters! A bold, brave proposal. But, are these MLA’s came from abroad after finishing higher studies or from different world? No, most of them I bet came from poor and middle class family same like us. Don’t you think they know the condition of these buses? Definitely they know.
But, instead make them compulsorily to travel at least once a week in public buses. Not just to realise the daily problems a commuter face, at least the bus officials would take some efforts to keep the buses clean.
I too also made several complaints about this problem. The Government
and MTC are interested only to collect huge money from the commuters,
but not ready to improve their services. Bus Stand shelters are rented
out to Rowdy Auto ricksaw drivers and petty shops and un-hygienic
eatery shops owners and collection everyday mamools from them.Anybody
can visit to Little Mount bus stand, opp.to MTC Depot and find the
truth. Whenever I lodge my complaint, the MTC authorities are sending
some ready made responce and then no other developments!This only eye-
was for the public.Government is providing Car and Jeep for the MD to
spot checking. They never bothered about the general public.
Government money is waste and also Chennai Corporation Councillor, are
interested to collect only commission for all activities. Then how
they will supervise the development and rectify it? These ara all our
fate and have to suffer another three and half years,in these
conditions only (some times worst than this!)
We common citizens should also shoulder the responsibility of maintaining the buses
clean. We should not litter in the buses. We should avoid eating inside and throwing
the paper or spitting. If every one understands our responsibility then we will be in a
position to demand our rights and needs from the government. None of the buses
could be cleaned between trips and all these buses start their day may be at 5 am or
even earlier. We all learnt in school that we should keep our surroundings clean which
we never ever bother to follow. Let's take an oath right now to not to litter in public
places and to drop all trash in respective bins even it means walking a block or holding
it until you get down from the bus and find a trash can. This will change the problems
of cleanliness. Remember govt is not the solution for all the problems nor chief
minister or her council can be traveling in all the buses all day. we need to do our stuff
first.
This article has not put forward the reason why the kovilambakkam residents have passed this resolution.It instead talks about problems of people elsewhere which does not have anything to dowith the resolution.
Well done...
People who have the power need to experience life as an ordinary person and understand what we go through to make an informed decision
Yes; this is a good idea. Since the Councillors/MLAs are elected to represent the people, they get a feel of the problems, they need to undertake journeys by the public transport system. Recently, the CM convened a meeting of councillors after she has to know of their involvement in various scams and gave them a dressing down. At least twice a month, the councillors and MLAs must travel in the public transport so that the know what is the difficulty of the people. The councillors/MLAs should not be allowed to get away from this reality.
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