With land acquisition for the Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS) expansion project connecting Velachery and St. Thomas Mount railway stations hanging in limbo, the Southern Railway has decided to run shuttle services connecting Ullagaram-Puzhithivakkam and the Adambakkam railway stations by next year.
The Southern Railway planned to integrate the MRTS with the suburban and Metro services by extending the tracks from Velachery to St. Thomas Mount. But it has now reworked the strategy because of the delay in acquiring about a 500 m stretch of the land for the track.
Having constructed the railway stations of Ullagaram-Puzhithivakkam and Adambakkam, the Southern Railway plans to operate shuttle train services to Velachery railway station from January next year.
A senior official said more than 75% of the work had been completed by installing ballastless tracks, construction of railway stations and commissioning of signal systems. For operating trains on either tracks, crossover facility had been provided at the Velachery railway station on the Adambakkam side. Also, signalling work for providing trains to cross to other track had been executed by building a new relay room, which was commissioned on September 5, he said.
The Railways had sanctioned ₹489 crore for the MRTS Extension Phase II project from Velachery to St. Thomas Mount. This year around ₹40 crore had been allocated for completing the work till Adambakkam.
V. Rama Rao, an office-bearer of the Traffic and Transport Forum, while welcoming the move to operate trains from Adambakkam, said regular commuters would still have to depend on Velachery station, from where trains were operated to Chennai Beach. He rued that the main purpose of the extension would not be served until the MRTS trains were linked with other multi-modal transport options already available at St. Thomas Mount. But commuters would have to wait for a few more years for the integration of multi-modal transport facility planned at St. Thomas Mount.