Survey for metro rail feasibility begins

Work to survey various parts of the city to prepare a feasibility report for the Coimbatore metro rail project began here recently.

Sources said consultants engaged by the Chennai Metro Rail Limited had deployed surveyors across the city. After studying various aspects needed for building a metro rail for the city and collecting details like bus routes, passenger movement, vehicle movement and strength, the consultants would submit the feasibility report to Chennai Metro Rail Limited.

The survey followed a high-level meeting held in Chennai, a few days ago. Senior bureaucrats from the Municipal Administration and Water Supply, Finance and a few other departments and CMRL representatives had participated in the meeting.

The study that the CMRL had earlier conducted a few months ago was for preparing the pre-feasibility report.

In the current survey, the consultant would look at routes where metro rail could be built, alternative routes, whether to build elevated rail corridor or on surface (at grade) or underground, the cost involved for land acquisition, wherever necessary, and construction, the sources said.

The survey is the latest development in Coimbatore metro rail proposal as previous governments had promised to provide metro rail services to the city.

Initially, the government said it would be metro rail for Coimbatore. Then it was changed to mono rail and now it was back to metro rail, the source said and added that in flip-flop what had changed on ground was the construction of elevated corridors and flyovers on Avinashi Road and Trichy Road, two of the arterial roads of Coimbatore.

The consultant preparing the feasibility report would have to factor in the flyovers under construction and proposed ones to come up with a viable suggestion, the sources added.