Focus on bus shelters in Chennai

Any discussion about the inadequacy of the city’s bus shelters has not led to anywhere, with the issue mired in a legal case for some time now.

During the past few years of litigation, Corporation councillors discounted the topic, officials feared to make decisions, and commuters remained mystified. Following a recent order of the Supreme Court, however, residents in the city have started demanding that councillors of many of the 200 wards discuss the topic at the Corporation Council meet later this month.

The Supreme Court order said the Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) was not authorised to manage bus shelters in the city; now, only the Corporation has the authority to commission and manage bus shelters at stops identified by the MTC.

The order, handing over 500 bus shelters from the MTC to the Corporation, has paved the way for implementing a project for uniformly-designed bus shelters in all parts of the city. The area under the Corporation has at least 1,840 bus stops that have been authorised by the

MTC. The total metropolitan area covering other local bodies has over 3,500 bus stops.

Following the verdict, AIADMK councillor Mohammed Imtiaz has requested officials to replace three dilapidated bus shelters on Adithanar Salai, Egmore High Road and Pantheon Road. Councillors of such developed parts of the city have demanded fewer bus shelters when compared to councillors of under-developed areas in north Chennai.

The Corporation has already commissioned over 200 modern stainless steel bus shelters on roads of developed areas in the core city area through the build operate transfer model. Most of them have been commissioned on roads in the old city limits.

“The private operators were unwilling to commission bus shelters in north Chennai and other under-developed parts of the added areas. Advertisement revenue in the north is likely to be poor. Pilferage is another concern in such areas,” said a Corporation official.

S. Saravanan, councillor of Ernavur in north Chennai, said the Corporation has been able to commission only three bus shelters in the ward in the past three years. “Residents had demanded ten. We need more bus shelters,” he said.

Based on the Supreme Court order, the Corporation is planning to implement changes to the existing PPP mode of commissioning bus shelters to improve the conditions of bus stops in added areas such as Tiruvottiyur, Manali, Madhavaram, Ambattur, Valasaravakkam, Alandur, Perungudi and Sholinganallur.

“We want to give equal weightage for all 200 wards. We will remodel the PPP mode to help all commuters,” said an official.