Velachery residents want mini-buses to be operated on Station Service Road

The residents of east Velachery have requested that mini-bus services be operated on the Station Service Road, being paved by the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC). The road belonging to the Southern Railway was handed over to GCC recently, and is being modernised at a cost of ₹26 crore. 

The Station Service Road, running parallel to the elevated railway tracks of the Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS), connects the southern arm of the Inner Ring Road extension near the Velachery railway station and the Taramani Link Road at MGR Salai, which is linked to Rajiv Gandhi Salai. 

The MRTS attracts a large number of commuters working in the IT corridor, and they face difficulties in accessing bus facilities from the Thiruvanmiyur and Taramani railway stations. With several IT companies functioning on MGR Salai, the hundreds of commuters getting down at the Taramani railway station have to depend on share autorickshaws and private autos for reaching the IT corridor. 

Social activist S. Kumararaja said Station Service Road was in a poor condition, but has been given a new makeover by the civic body. This could help commuters using the MRTS service if the Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) could operate small bus services from the Velachery bus terminus to Sholinganallur via the Station Service Road and MGR Salai. Another bus could be operated from Velachery railway station to Thiruvanimyur bus terminus via Station Service Road and LB Road. 

A senior official of the MTC said that a few buses from the proposed last mile connectivity project, under which 300 mini-buses are planned to be operated under Gross Cost Contract (GCC), could be operated on the State Service Road in the future to explore revenue viability. Already a mini-bus service has been planned for operating from Velachery bus terminus to Sholinganallur via Kallukuttai housing tenements and Perungudi, he added.