The ad hoc traffic arrangement on a short stretch of Anna Salai, clamped in part due to the stormwater drain work on Dams Road, is showing signs that it might survive the expediency that necessitated it. The intrusive SWD work on Dams Road is no longer a gaping trench, but a completed assignment tucked well into the earth towards Cooum. The “emergency traffic measure” undertaken on account of it, however continues.
The traffic arrangement has been bettered to a point where it should invite many nods of approval. A pathway has been delineated for motorists from the Parrys-and-Wallajah Road side who might want to enter Dams Road. With barricades marking this pathway, it has been made sure this traffic is not on a collision course with the one pelting down Anna Salai towards the India Posts head office,
A barricaded pathway created for motorists entering Dams Road | Photo Credit: PRINCE FREDERICK
But motorists who have been batting for this stretch (from Dams Road junction to Blackers Road junction) being made a permament two-way (which it was long ago) will have to rein in their hope. At best, this stretch would function as a part-time two-way. It would wear vehicular traffic the way someone might wear a waist belt with a different colour on each side: one colour now, and flip the belt to have the other colour on display.
The two-way option would be exercised whenever the volume of vehicular traffic teeters on the higher side. From what has been observed so far, there are no hours set in stone as “two-way hours”. Even during rush hour, if the traffic thins down, the default one-way system might click back into place.
At best, this arrangement would be kept “permanently temporary, one factor contributing noticeably to it. Whenever the stretch of Anna Salai from Dams Road junction to Blackers Road junction funtions as a two-way, more hands have to be on the deck, as the traffic is being regulated manually.
Published - November 06, 2023 05:31 pm IST
