KOCHI: The long wait of Edappally residents for a railway underpass is expected to come to an end soon. The construction of the underpass which begins on Saturday will be completed in 64 days, say railway officials.

The woes of the residents living near the Edappally railway station began after the railway gate was closed following the commissioning of the rail overbridge. “With the commissioning of the RoB, the Railways closed the gate on the Edappally-Cheranelloor road,” said a nearby resident.

According to another resident, this resulted in almost doubling the distance to the Amrita hospital. “The temples, mosques and churches got divided geographically for devotees,” said the resident. Following this, the residents have been demanding an underpass.

In 2016-17 fiscal, Rs 1.16 crore and Rs 1.25 crore were allotted for the underpass from the MLA funds of P T Thomas and Hibi Eden, respectively. An amount of `1 crore was also released from the fund of the then MP, K V Thomas. “Funds were sanctioned beforehand because the project was to be carried out by the Engineering Department of the Railways. For the project to start, an advance amount had to be deposited with the Railways,” said Hibi.

However, even after depositing the money, the project got delayed due to various technical issues, he added. When this was pointed out in the Lok Sabha, Union Railway Minister Piyush Goyal said the delay was due to the waterlogging caused by heavy rain, said Hibi. “The minister assured us that the project will begin in January.”

Following this, the MP met with the Divisional Railway Manager of Thiruvananthapuram and urged him to direct the departments concerned to release the girders required for the project and also control traffic in the section during the period of underpass construction.