Cables below Railway Border Road hinder repair work for over decade

The Railway Border Road near the Chromepet railway station is one of the most important roads, as it connected Nehru Nagar, Venkat Ramana Nagar, Hasthinapuram and Chitalapakkam to the railway station. The road is about 1.5 km long, with one half of it belonging to the Pallavaram municipality and the other to the Southern Railway. “This road was laid 15 years ago by the Pallavaram Municipality. Since then, no repair has been taken up,” said V Santhanam, president, Pallavaram Residents Welfare Association.

According to municipality officials, they are willing to repair the road but the Railways has denied permission. “It is due to this that people are made to suffer,” said a municipality official.

Santhanam claimed that on behalf of the residents’ welfare association, they have met railways officials many times and gave them petitions to repair the road. “But, they are not willing to take any action,” he said.

Speaking to DT Next, Pallavaram Municipal Engineer Kurupaiah Raja said, “We tried to repair the road but the Railway is not allowing us. We even tried to do some patchworks but we arenot even getting permission even for that.”

When contacted, a senior Railway official claimed that they do not allow the road to be dug or repaired as there were several underground cables used by the railways. “If the cables get damaged during repairs, train service would be affected. Hence, we cannot allow repair of the road,” the official said.