Environment Ministry nod obtained, Perungalathur over bridge work to restart soon

CHENNAI: The State Highways Department would soon take up the remaining portion of the Perungalathur road over bridge (RoB) work that would connect Tambaram Eastern Bypass with the GST Road and help decongest traffic in Tambaram, with the Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) approving the diversion of the Vandalur reserve forest land.

The pending works include the construction of the last arm of the bridge connecting Tambaram Eastern Bypass, laying the service road, drain-cum-footpath, and executing the road safety measures for the entire RoB.

The construction of the RoB to replace level crossing-32 between Tambaram and Vandalur Railway station near Perungalathur, and an elliptical-shaped rotary flyover on the GST Road with six arms began in 2019. The contract for the construction work was awarded to an Erode-based company in October 2019 for Rs 155 crore.

After work worth Rs 111.9 crore, which is 72 per cent of the contract value, was completed, the contract was foreclosed in July this year due to delay in the land acquisition process.

The department has already completed the work on the Chengalpattu-Chennai arm, Srinivasa Raghavan Nagar arm (on the Perungalathur side), and Chennai-Chengalpattu arm and opened them for traffic.

However, the work could not be fully completed because of the delay in getting approval for using 0.9547 hectares of forest land and shifting the substation on the eastern side.

An official source told DT Next that the completion of the last leg of the RoB along with connecting the Tambaram Eastern Bypass, which branches out of Velachery-Tambaram Road, would ease the flow of traffic on GST Road at Perungalathur and Tambaram. "We have speeded up efforts on both works which were delayed due to forest land diversion. Now we have got approval for the land diversion and the works will be completed soon," the official said.