‘Kauvery’ TBM is expected to arrive at Adyar Junction station soon, says CMRL

Chennai Metro Rail's TBM 'Kauvery' to reach Adyar Junction station next month amid challenging ground conditions.

After several months of prolonged efforts crushing rock and boring through earth, Chennai Metro Rail Limited’s tunnel boring machine (TBM) ‘Kauvery’ will reach the under-construction Adyar Junction Metro station next month.

For the Phase II Project, several TBMs are at work in various areas of the city to build the underground portions. In Adyar, TBM ‘Kauvery’ started its journey on Greenways Road in February 2023, continued tunnelling under the Adyar and eventually crossed it. Subsequently, the machine had to be operated amid mixed ground conditions, including hard rock, which posed a lot of difficulty, and the workers had to continuously monitor and replace the tools owing to wear and tear.

“The hard rock (charnockite) quality is changing now. The machines are currently dealing with ground conditions that have both hard and soft rocks. It will have to fit in another 190 rings of precast segments to complete the tunnel. The work is expected to be completed within a few weeks. Our target is that the machine makes a breakthrough at Adyar Junction station by the end of September,” an official said.

The other TBM running on the stretch, ‘Adyar’, has also completed tunnelling under the river. Its drive will continue to bore through the tough ground conditions, and will take a while before it can arrive at the Adyar Junction station. Sources said the work to build the shaft at the Adyar Junction station had suffered a delay but it had now been completed as well.

Stations such as Greenways Road and Adyar Junction fall under corridor 3 (Madhavaram to SIPCOT) of the 118.9-km Phase II Project. The construction of underground and elevated stretches of the other two corridors in the project — Light House to Poonamallee (corridor 4) and Madhavaram to Sholinganallur (corridor 5) — are under way across the city.