Many of the city's roads are not in the best of shape: even many well-paved roads have developed craters; on top of this, road cuts have caused havoc.
Most of the road cuts are being done by the Chennai Metrowater and the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board. Dug up stretches — such as North Boag Road-Vijayaraghava Road and Bazulla Road in T. Nagar and Triplicane High Road-Bharathi Salai junctions — are slowing down or snarling up the traffic.
Similarly, traffic pile ups are a major issue in K.K. Nagar for over a month now as the Rajamannar Salai and P.T. Rajan Road junction have been dug up by Metrowater. This has had a cascading effect at the Ashok Nagar-Vadapalani junction.
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Nearly half of the dug up D' Silva Road and Bhakthavatchalam Road in Alwarpet area is out of bounds for road users.
Citing the electrocution of a government employee from New Delhi on Wall Tax Road on September 5, TNEB Chairman C.P. Singh said the Board had sent letters to the various government departments and private telephone operators to inform it about road cuts so the Board can take steps to avoid exposure of power cables.
Officials have also been instructed to replace weakened poles. In the northern suburbs, such as Manali, Kathivakkam and Tiruvottiyur, road cuts pose a bigger danger than falling trees. Tiruvottiyur municipal chairman R. Jayaraman said, “Digging up of roads for underground drainage network have led to a few mishaps.”
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As the southern suburbs lack underground distribution for power cables, much damage is reported to dangling power cables.
A TNEB official said staff and local bodies are pruning branches in contact with overhead power cables on Velachery Main Road, Pazhavanthangal and Nanganallur.
(With inputs from K. Lakshmi, S. Aishwarya, R. Sujatha and R. Srikanth)