Lack of suburban train service has made access to express/mail trains an arduous task for people of Tiruvallur and surroundings.

They now have to start either the previous night or arrange private transport to reach Arakkonam or MGR Chennai Central railway station – spending anywhere between two and a half to four hours, at considerable expense – to board express trains due to lack of suburban train services and Southern Railway’s (SR) reluctance to increase stoppage of express trains at district headquarters.

Both Arakkonam and Chennai Central are located 40 km away from Tiruvallur. In normal times, travellers reach Central – a distance of about 27 km – in an hour and a half by EMUs. But in the absence of suburban trains, people are now forced to take a bus to Poonamallee, board another bus from there to Central, which would consume not less than two and half hours during non-peak hours and up to four hours during peak hours. To put this comparison, it would take only around four hours to reach Salem from Tiruvallur.

Though traffic to Arakkonam is less, there hardly are any buses. Even the few available buses are operated to cater to the villages en route, and are hence time-consuming, complain regular train travellers who are now forced to use private transport.

Earlier, they used to take an EMU from Beach that would leave Tiruvallur at 5.35 am and reached Arakkonam a little past 6 am, well ahead of time to catch Kovai Express that reaches at 7.30 am.

“Now, we must start before 4 am by private transport, as neither EMUs nor buses are available at that time. Or, we must reach Central or Arakkonam the previous night to board Kovai Express,” said K Baskar, a former member of Divisional Rail Users Consultative Committee (DRUCC).

“Only 11 of the 50-odd trains crossing Tiruvallur stop here. We are only asking for the stoppage of an additional nine trains. Just a minute’s stoppage by some more trains would solve the issue of lack of EMU and buses. We have sent representation up to the Prime Minister’s Office in this regard,” Baskar added.

A few months ago, 21 Sharmik special trains were operated to transport north Indian migrant labourers. And several express trains to Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Coimbatore were operated from Tiruvallur during 2015 floods due to availability of six platforms with turn back facility. “But when people need it during such difficult times, neither the State government nor Railway department is obliging,” he complained. The issue of stopping more express trains was taken up in the Parliament by the MP from Tiruvallur, K Jayakumar. However, the ministry has yet to accede to the people’s request.