The State Highways Department has started work on re-building permanent, raised medians on Velachery Main Road and Mudichur Road, both important arterial roads in the southern suburbs, for improving riding conditions and reducing the accident rate.
Sources in the Highways Department claimed that in several places, these medians had been damaged during the floods in December 2015.
They were useful at that point of time to drain floodwater into water channels and waterbodies in the southern suburbs.
First phase
The project is being taken up for a stretch of 5 km between Sembakkam and IAF Road near Tambaram in the first phase.
The road has several improvement works, including widening from two-lanes to four-lanes all along the 21-km-long stretch between Tambaram and Saidapet via Velachery (except certain narrow spots in Selaiyur and Pallikaranai), among other works.
Likewise, the precast concrete blocks were used to plug the huge openings on Mudichur Road, which had suffered a heavy damage during the rains in December 2015.
Though slightly raised medians were provided then, they became useless owing to re-laying of roads, which raised the surface on a par with the medians.
Due to this, the tendency of motorists to proceed in the wrong direction and ride over the medians, as well as that of pedestrians to walk across the road in the absence of designated zebra crossings continued unabated, leading to risks for all concerned.
After completion of construction work on surplus channel near Narayanapuram, the Highways Department is now constructing road medians to suit the current height of the road, officials said.
