THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The government has been sitting on three different proposals submitted by various agencies to end the major bottleneck at Pettah junction, which is faced by motorists travelling on the airport road.
On Tuesday, a child was killed by a tipper there. While the whole stretch from Asan square, Palayam to airport is a four-lane road, the Pettah Rail Overbridge (ROB) is the only narrow stretch with just two lanes.
The ROB opens into Pettah market junction where five different roads from Kavaradi, Anayara etc intersect. The signal system is not feasible here and always two to five police officers are deployed to manage traffic.
“The simplest plan we submitted was to widen the ROB by taking away the sparsely used existing footpath. An alternative new pedestrian bridge can be constructed beside the ROB,” said senior traffic officials.
“The second plan we gave was to build an additional bridge on the north of the existing ROB. The third was to extend the existing ROB using three more pillars and create a flyover to avoid an intersection,” they added.
Similar plans submitted by the road fund board were never implemented by the government. “The motorists get restless and risk everyone’s life here. People complain when they have to stop two times at the same signal,” Traffic CI (North) Niyas said.
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