CHENNAI: If everything goes as planned, then in 2.5 years city residents could comfortably travel in a metro train on a 16km elevated line from Powerhouse in Kodambakkam to Poonamallee and a few months later, they could take the same train to busy city localities like Marina Beach, Mylapore or T Nagar that are in between the 10km Lighthouse-Powerhouse underground line.
In one of the tenders floated recently, CMRL revealed that it has set a deadline of June 2025 for commercial operations of the Powerhouse to Poonamallee bypass and December 2025 for Lighthouse to Powerhouse and the remaining part of the whole project. Both the sections are part of the 26.1km Lighthouse to Poonamallee bypass corridor-4 with 27 stations, which is one of the three corridors of 118.9km phase-2 project.
“We have been stressing on the 2025 deadline in all our meetings and efforts are being taken to meet this deadline. We are pushing to meet the deadline but it all depends on the contractors,” said a CMRL official. It is to recall that in the state budget last year, it was announced that the phase-2 project will be completed by 2025.
When the corridor-4 opens, it will link several city localities like the Marina Beach, Mylapore, Mylapore, Nandanam, T Nagar, Kodambakkam and Vadapalani with the western suburbs like Porur, Iyyapanthangal, Kattupakkam and Poonamallee that are otherwise poorly linked by public transport.
Recently, CMRL floated a tender to procure nearly 193 escalators and 174 elevators for installation in the stations linking the 26.1km corridor. In the tender document, it said that the Poonamallee bypass to Kodambakkam Powerhouse metro stretch will have 18 elevated and Kodambakkam flyover metro to Lighthouse metro will open with nine underground metro stations.
While construction of the pillars for the elevated corridor has already commenced on the Porur to Poonamallee stretch, several locations along the corridor like Kodambakkam and Vadapalani are barricaded and pre-construction work has commenced.
Lighthouse to Poonamallee bypass is the only corridor where construction contracts have all been awarded. This includes four contracts to build the entire line with the stations and one contract to build the maintenance depot at Poonamallee. It is also the only corridor where a contract has been awarded for track work, while tenders have been floated for electrical systems.
