High vehicle influx chokes many roads, traffic grinds to halt

Chennai

While Kamarajar Salai was closed from 6 am to accommodate the crowd and make way for the Chief Minister’s convoy, motorists and MTC buses had to take detours as arranged by the traffic police to reach their destination.

Hundreds of buses and vans in which the party cadre reached the city from different districts were parked on the stretch leading to the memorial. Motorists had a tough time navigating through that. The vehicle movement on Anna Salai, Poonamallee High Road and Jawaharlal Nehru Salai was on a snail pace. Several buses were parked on the already-narrow Wall Tax Road and it became not motorable.

As the vehicle inflow from districts continued even after 6 am, heavy traffic jam was reported on East Coast Road, Rajiv Gandhi Salai (OMR) and GST Road.

Speaking to DT Next, Additional Commissioner (Traffic) N Kannan said more than 5,000 vehicles, of which about 2,600 buses, entered the city for the function and the vehicles were diverted to different roads. “There was congestion on certain stretches but the traffic did not halt completely anywhere,” he said.

Traffic was affected on GST Road, too. Tiruchy-Chennai National Highway was buzzing with traffic from early morning. Many took stops at Maamandur and Maraimalainahar to bate and get ready near the farm wells there. The traffic was affected from Vandalur till the airport. Motorista complained that it took nearly two hours to cross the 12km stretch. The traffic police tried to control the situation by diverting vehicles from Perungalthur via Nedukundram to the camp road or from Tambaram flyover to Velachery via Medavakkam.