Dedicated bus lanes on stretches of GST Road and Rajiv Gandhi Salai recommended

: A report commissioned by the Transport Department to evolve a ‘comprehensive bus mobility plan' for the city has strongly recommended the creation of dedicated bus lanes on stretches of Grand Southern Trunk (GST) Road and Rajiv Gandhi Salai.

A senior official of Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) said that about eight corridors have been identified where building a Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS) is feasible.

Phase-I of the plan envisages a BRT network traversing the Rajiv Gandhi Salai, Thoraipakkam-Pallavaram Radial Road and the Grand Southern Trunk Road, where it would stretch up to St. Thomas Mount. The network would resemble the lower half of the alphabet ‘A'. It would be about 50 to 60 km length.

The report prepared by the Ahmedabad-based Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP) observes that the average speed of MTC buses has dropped to just 6 kmph during rush hour.

Cars and two wheelers are taking too much of road space, slowing public transport buses to a crawl. For example, on Rajiv Gandhi Salai, though private vehicles move less than a third of the passenger volume that flows through the road, they take up 64 per cent of the road space.

To reverse the trend in favour of public transport buses, the report proposes a system modelled after the Ahmedabad BRT, with air-conditioned buses plying on dedicated lanes on either side of the median.

ITDP Director Shreya Gadepalli says that buses are crucial since they transport such large numbers of people. “Many areas in the western, southern and northern parts of the city are ideal for BRT corridors. There is already high demand for existing bus services and roads are wide enough,” she says.

Transport Secretary Md. Nasimuddin said that the report is being studied and a final plan will be prepared after taking practical considerations into account. “The proposal has to be concretised and the financial details are being worked out in coordination with the MTC.”

The CMDA's Chennai Comprehensive Transportation Study envisages 84-km of BRT in the city by 2026.

“The proposal has to be concretised and the financial details are being worked out in coordination with the MTC”