A tour of pavements in Chennai

An open danger in Teynampet and a deadly pedestal in Nungambakkam, pavements are hardly friendly for the public in Chennai

Up to a point, Valluvar Kottam High Road has a median. The two-arm lamp posts one notices on the median are new, having been installed a few months ago. The entire road was brought under this exercise. On the section of the road where lamp posts have to be fixed on the pavements, for want of a median, there is a pedestal topped with short screw-rods left in a limbo. At present, it functions dutifully as a safety hazard to pedestrians, particularly at night. Until the time it is put to its intended use, the threat it poses can be neutralised by capping it with neatly-fitting block and ensuring it does not elude notice. 

At first look, an empty electrical cable drum roller sits squat on the pavement at Anna Salai in Teynampet, right outside Seshachalam Centre.

At second look, what appeared to be an encroachment rapidly redeems itself, emerging a life-saver. There is a hidden danger — an open one, in truth — on that section of the pavement.

An opening to the stormwater drain underneath is not covered with a lid. A cable dangles across the pavement, right in front of this gaping hole, as if planted out there to trip unsuspecting pedestrians into the hole.

What saves the day for pedestrians is the empty electrical cable drum roller, as it stops them from even thinking of using this patch of the pavement.

When the head is in the clouds, the feet would likely falter. Bus commuters would have their eyes fixed on boards of oncoming buses, and these are well above terra firma. If it is their bus to board, often, there is an instinctive dash for it, even when it is unwarranted. Bring into this picture a cable that moves horizontally not under the earth but well over it, and there is a perfect recipe for a fall. At the bus stop outside Co-optex on Pantheon Road in Egmore, bus commuters now have an opportunity to savour this recipe.

A cable slithers down the pavement along a section of EVR Periyar Salai, takes a curved course and continues down the pavement on EVK Sampath Salai.