Road medians in most narrow & busy streets were suddenly disappearing. After years of adding obstacles to make the public fall in line, the traffic police now seem to be trusting drivers to behave themselves. Are they trusting too much?
Tamil historians used to boast that Ancient Madurai under Pandyan kings had wide roads. They truly built a planned city with outer walls etc. But the roads are not that much wide. It pales in comparison to historic roads & roundanas in Mysore (ofcourse Mysore roads seems to be of recent origin while Madurai roads may be thousands of years old, not a real comparison there).
Now to an interesting question. Which one will be widest & most happening road in Madurai?
The wider roads in Madurai are at best four-laners, usually two lanes with a median at the centre. So don’t be disappointed.
The Alagarkovil Road at Goripalayam used to be an important & wide-looking stretch in 80s, but the 80 feet road from KK nagar to Kuruvikaaran Saalai was more wider & comfortable.
It showed signs of developing into a bustling shopping district, but it’s parallel road on Anna Nagar took over.
The Anna nagar main road doesn’t have much platform space, but is four-track. It now has the vibrance of a shopping area, but lack of parking space hinders it to realize its full potential.
All these roads were on the northern side of River Vaigai. On the south there used to be no wide roads to speak off. There is a small stretch between Teppakulam and Nirmala School which can look wide, but it isn’t a happening stretch.
Now, to boast a most happening road, the southern side takes over. The Bye-pass road, with service roads on either side, ample shoulders after wide canals & avenue trees made it a natural choice for shoppers. Sure enough, shops have flocked for this road and is fast becoming an elite shopping & happening place.
Naidu hall, World of Titan, Raymonds, Vimal, Megamart, Sony World, Panasonic Brand shop, Basics and local big shopping names such as Milan, Anandha & Anandha, Madura Shoes… bye-pass road surely overtook all other roads in the city.
The central part of the road needs to be widened. Work on this is moving on snail’s pace. Once the new NH 4-track north-south Golden Corridor bye-pass is completed (hoping for March 2008), much of the container lorry traffic will be reduced, leaving the current bye-pass road to develop into a full shopping area.
It might need to be renamed by then. Guess it will be named after Gandhi (MG Road, reminding bangaluru!) or Anna (we have many identical named areas as in chennai, but we dont have anna salai!).
So Madurai’s most happening & wide road is …. the Bye-pass road (sigh, strange name!)
Twenty years back I used to lament about living in a slow city (nee, village) called Madurai. But over the last decade, I’m glad that Madurai is growing slowly when compared to other cities in Tamilnadu. With rapid expansion, even Tuticorin & Erode seems to be growing faster than Madurai.
It takes at least 50 minutes to commute on a four-wheeler to cross 10kms within city in Chennai during peak hours. Worse in Bangalore. Coimbatore is only marginally better. Compared to this, Madurai is scoring highly even though it has narrow roads.
Seems a blessing in disguise!
Much to the relief of Maduraiites, the bridge from Periyar bus stand to Railway station west entry is opened. It’s wider than the old bridge and eases the traffic to a great extent.
The other half from Periyar bus stand to Ellis Nagar is still under construction. Once completed, it will be a 4 track bridge and relives congestion on western side.
As Chennai, Erode and other corporations go for stone walled 3 feet medians on arterial roads, Madurai too is starting to build such medians on Alagarkoil road (at Goripalayam).
These are nice looking barriers, but unlike other cities, sand started collecting at the edge of the road closer to stone wall. As the foreign lady once observed, ‘Madurai roads disappearing into dirt on either side’.
This is part of the series of infrastructure projects under development in and around Madurai. Madurai have National Highways going out in 7 directions (towards Dindigul, Trichy, Rameswaram, Tuticorin, Tirunelveli, Shencottai and Kochi) of which atleast 4 routes were proposed to become 4-track roads.
Besides, the ring-road which is essentially a 4-track road is proposed to make it a full-circle around Madurai. The remaining parts
It’s not uncommon to see a dog lie crushed on arterial roads, particularly where high tonnage vehicles ply. When I see one while riding, my reaction would be to careful not to run over them and promptly forget it after crossing the point. If there is any road-side vendors nearby, they’ll arrange to drag the corpse out of the road (out of sight), otherwise it will lie there for hours.
When two German tourists to the city decided to care a dog with smashed hind legs in an accident and wailing for hours, it was indeed a sobering effect. The incident apparently happened in the busy East Masi Street, with numerous people passing through without noticing. (News item in Hindu)
The German girls who are clearly animal lovers, and have an interesting look on our way of life. They say, ‘Nowhere in the world, dogs and cattle move freely on the roads like here’. Was it a compliment? a defect? Should we be proud in this type of animal freedom?
The Goodshed street that is usually clogged with lorries off-loading sanitary & ceramic tiles has become a primary entrance to reach West Masi street from West Veli street. It’s a welcome change which helps in relieving congestion. To go with it, the usually quaint Sambandamoorthy street (opp. Ayyappan temple on west masi st.) is also made one-way in the opposite direction.
Another new one-way system has come up between South Masi street & South Avanimoola street, but the narrow roads with cycle traffic makes it look ineffective.
The technologists at Thiagarajar College of Engineering here has been testing various methods of road laying, using Vilacheri as their test area. I vaguely remember about testing with rubber. They have also tested using plastic waste.
Overall, it seems an ideal solution. The plastic wastes won’t degrade for decades & a problem in waste disposal. Using it on road seem a good idea. The roads should be there forever so non-degradable qualities are quite welcome. Dumping plastic waste literally on road is something we are naturally happy to do. 
Now research details emerged favourably and they are extending the technique to a few areas (12 panchayats around Madurai). They plan to source plastic waste from the neighbourhood and use it on the road. A cost-effective solution to recycle waste plastic locally.
The Government seems to be favourable. But there are some discerning voices whether the usage will be safe (see Toxics Link site). Some of their questions like
If this a superior technology then why haven’t Western countries jumped into this bandwagon of using waste plastics in road laying
isn’t convincing.
The green mini-buses are the lifeline of most suburbs around Madurai. Most of the newly developed areas like Gomathipuram & Yagava nagar near Anna Nagar & a plethora of ‘Nagar’s between Iyer Bungalow & Moondru maavadi have narrow 20ft. roads as main throughfare.
Worse, the roads under village panchayats were poorly paved. Most of these roads have giant craters & will become pools of red slush on rainy days. It is only these private mini-buses that brave the odds for them.
The buses suffer due to bumpy roads & dust conditions. Some of the buses had to push start by commuters themselves while a few others are well maintained. In any case, if you prefer a ride in these buses, be prepared to an assault of blaring music!
