Monday's unrelenting rain played havoc with the city's traffic, throwing the MTC's schedules out of gear and heaping further damage on the already crumbling roads.The Metropolitan Transport Corporation's 2800 buses on the road on Monday suffered huge delays, with the time taken to complete a trip doubling on many of the routes, a senior MTC official said.
A. Raghavan, a commuter, said that it took nearly two-and-a-half hours to cover the 7-km distance between the Kathipara junction and Ashok Nagar. “Water-logging was a major problem even near CMBT. Most buses were moving at a snail's pace,” he said. MTC Managing Director V. Babu said that there was a 50 per cent drop in patronage. “Office-goers and visitors to the beach constitute a major chunk of our regular users. The rain kept all of them indoors,” he added.
According to him, the number of scheduled trips for each bus could not be completed as none of the subways could be used and buses had to be diverted. Nearly 25 per cent of MTC's staff was also absent on Monday.
Locomotive derailed
A shunting locomotive derailed near Egmore station around 7.30 in the morning due to water on the tracks. The Guruvayoor Express was delayed by more than two hours as a result.
A senior Southern Railway official said suburban train services were hit and most services were late by 10 to 15 minutes.
