With the fear rife that traffic congestion at the Edappally Junction will worsen following the opening of three flyovers in the Aroor-Edapally NH Bypass during the past two months, technocrat E. Sreedharan, has reiterated his demand for an underpass linking the bypass with Edappally-Guruvayur NH corridor.
“The DMRC had, while readying the foundations for the Edappally flyover, maintained sufficient gap so that an underpass could be built perpendicular to the flyover. The only precaution that ought to be taken is that the underpass should not encounter water logging during rains. Foolproof methods are available for this,” he said. The situation at Edappally is such that the flyover built beneath the metro viaduct in the east-west direction takes much fewer vehicles than the road corridor that links NH Bypass with the NH that leads to Guruvayur. This resulted in traffic planners and Kochiites saying that the flyover ought to have been built in the perpendicular direction.
Traffic movement was relatively smooth on Monday. But snarls at the junction could get worse in the coming days since motorists from Aroor will be able to travel up to Edappally easily through the three new flyovers (at Kundannoor, Vyttila, and Palarivattom), said Arun Raj, ACP of City Traffic Police, East.
Referring to the situation in Vyttila, where traffic movement in the east-west direction is cumbersome, despite the opening of a six-lane flyover, Mr. Sreedharan, who jumped on the political bandwagon recently by joining the BJP, said the foundations of the flyover and metro viaduct might hamper construction of an underpass at the junction linking SA Road with the Vyttila-Pettah Road.
Moreover, an underpass might be costlier than a flyover since provision would have to be made for draining away water.
“The chaos at the junction could have been prevented if the State government had considered a plan that I suggested of a three-level interchange. Under this, a four-lane flyover linking SA Road and Pettah Road and ending beyond the exit of Vyttila Hub would have been built parallel to a metro viaduct built at the same level on its left side. This could have been done with minimal land acquisition. The flyover parallel to NH Bypass would then come at the second level, above the two structures. A roundabout would have sufficed for vehicles taking a right turn at the junction,” he said.
