A joint inspection by a team of officials from the Department of Highways and the Southern Railway was conducted on Saturday as part of the efforts to start work on the road overbridge (ROB) that will replace the manned railway level crossing (LC 81) near the railway station in Vaniyambadi town near Tirupattur.
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The joint inspection comes a few days after the local traders closed their shops, demanding immediate resumption of the bridge work by the government agencies. “Preparatory work for the new facility is being discussed by senior officials of the department at the State Secretariat. Work is expected to start soon,” said K. Sundar, Divisional Engineer (DE), Department of Highways for Projects (Vellore).
Highways officials said that work for the new facility was delayed mainly due to land acquisition on both sides of the railway line. As areas around the railway station are densely populated, the inspection was to alter the design, reducing the dependence on additional land for the project.
Originally, the bridge project was proposed in 2007 at an estimated cost of ₹13 crore to replace the railway level crossing. Due to procedural delays, the project was again taken up by the State government in 2011 with a revised estimate of ₹17 crore. The project will be done jointly by the Southern Railway and the State Highways department.
In January 2019, as a stop-gap measure to address the land acquisition issue, the State government changed the project into a vehicular subway at a cost of ₹22 crore. In fact, the railway level crossing was also closed to facilitate the subway work. However, due to a delay in commencing the work, the Madras High Court subsequently directed the Southern Railway to open the level crossing for public use.