Chennai Corporation plans to fully take over road restoration works after complaints on poor repairs by other agencies

Owing to repeated complaints from the public over improper restoration of road cuts by the contractors of various service departments, the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) is planning to fully take over road restoration works in the city.

As per current regulations, the restoration of the road cuts must be carried out by the service departments after obtaining permission and paying necessary charges.

Valasaravakkam Ward Committee Chairman V.Rajan said, “Previously, pipelines were previously laid, and restoration charges were paid to the GCC based on the material used — whether cement or bitumen — and the nature of the road, like bus routes, interior roads, or highways.”

“Later, as per a government order, service departments such as the Metro Water Department and TANGEDCO [Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation] handled the restoration,” he added.

He noted that the GCC has a defined process for relaying roads — starting with GSB (Granular Sub-Base), followed by sand, wet mix, M20 grade concrete if required, and bitumen. Further, GCC outlines procedures for road cuts, including restoration with a 3.5-meter wide, 30 millimetre thick bituminous concrete (BC) layer for single cuts. For bus route roads, double charges apply, along with a 40 millimetre thick BC layer and cold milling. Cables and pipes must be buried at a minimum depth of one meter below the road level.

“But this is not properly followed by contractors engaged by other departments. The contractors roped in by other departments simply dump debris or use low-grade cement to close the road cuts made for pipeline or cable work.”

He added that each road relaying work taken up by the Corporation is checked by a third-party Project Management Consultant (PMC), a step often skipped by the other service agencies. “Even though several crores are spent for road-related works, in the end, it is the GCC that gets blamed by the people. To curb this and improve coordination, a request was made to Mayor R.Priya for GCC to take up all road restoration works directly,” he said.

A senior official in the GCC said that the Corporation has often been taking up road restoration works for road cuts made by CMWSSB and collectes the corresponding charges later. If GCC is made responsible for road cuts, the work will become easier, he added.

Mayor R.Priya, at the council meeting held on Monday, said she would talk to State-level authorities regarding this.

Commissioner J.Kumaragurubaran said this will be a good move and State-level authorities talks with State-level authorities are soon to be taken up for this, he added.