Motorists are complaining of slow movement of vehicles on Anna Salai, one of the city’s arterial roads that has developed several battered stretches after the recent rains.
The top layer of the road is worn out and the number of bad patches and potholes has increased. Dust and gravel are all over the road, which poses a threat to two-wheeler riders.
“On Saturday night, when I was returning from a movie in Royapettah, I saw a bike rider skidding badly on the stretch just after the Anand Theatre bus stop. Luckily, he did not fall and managed to balance himself,” said R. Krishnan, a resident of Egmore.
Similarly, near LIC, just beyond the iron sheets that cover the road, there is a bad patch at a curve.
“If interior roads are bad during the rains, we can understand, since the government cannot repair all roads immediately. But a major road like this one should be in top condition. Such bad stretches lead to increase in travel time. They seem to have done a shoddy work with a few bricks being dumped here and there. The gravel has not even been removed,” said Kamalakannan, a cab driver.
Sources in the Highways Department said Metro Rail was building stations on these stretches and that the agency was responsible for their maintenance and repairs. Consumer activist T. Sadagopan said that though the department is right in saying it had no control over these stretches, it is the government’s duty to maintain basic services at all times.
“If the CMRL is not doing maintenance, the Highways Department should do the repair work and claim the expenses from the agency,” he said.
