Traffic jams that are reported in the city’s narrow or busy junctions seem to be more due to the abrupt decision to dig roads by the civic authorities or other government or private agencies, motorists complain.
It is humanly impossible to drive around the Masi Streets or Avani Moola Streets or along busy stretches like Arasaradi-Kalavasal roads.
On the one hand, there is a steady rise in the flow of vehicles in many parts of the city and on the other side, the unannounced digging operation on the middle of a road by a designated contractor on a busy thoroughfare takes even the traffic police by shock.
A classic example took place on Friday – a handful of traffic police were busy diverting vehicles at the Kalavasal junction to take the by-pass road. As they refused permission along the Arasaradi-New Jail Road in the forenoon, vehicles piled up on the intersection leading to chaos. Inquiries revealed that the Corporation had to ‘urgently’ check a point and thus had to carry out digging, traffic police said. This is just a tip of the iceberg.
Around the Meenakshi Temple, complaints of gutter water mixing with drinking water had forced the Corporation authorities to check the pipelines last week.
For over a month, the Corporation authorities, who dug up a pit near a private hospital on the Old Natham Road are still working on repairing the leaks. This has been causing huge traffic bottleneck on the stretch.
Again a fortnight back, shopkeepers on Town Hall Road SMSed the media and some even wrote on the Facebook of Madurai Collector to intervene into the issue as gutter water was overflowing along the road. Whether action was taken swiftly is a different story.
But, what had irked the road users was that the authorities had been reportedly taking their own time to arrest the leak.
In some other such ‘operations’ as the workers had failed to remove the debris after attending to the works, it had spread along the road side causing irritation to motorists. Recently, when works were completed in front of the Vishaal de Mall, the road was hurriedly laid, but the dust triggered was causing untold hardships to two-wheeler riders and commuters. Traffic constables regulating the vehicles are a pitiable group as they are forced to inhale the dust.
The Corporation authorities should understand the difficulties of motorists, is the prayer from tax paying citizens.
