Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa today inaugurated metro rail service (through video conference) from Chennai Airport to Little Mount in the presence of Union Urban Development Minister M Venkaiah Naidu and Minister of State for Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Pon Radhakrishnan.

The St Thomas Mount metro station, which is Corridor II of the project, was also inaugurated. Operations on Corridor I on the lower level of the Alandur metro station will also commence from today, she said.

She had already inaugurated 10.15-km elevated section from Koyambedu to Alandur on June 29, 2015. Passenger operations on the 1.28-km stretch from Alandur to St Thomas Mount will commence shortly after obtaining clearance from the Commissioner for Metro Rail Safety. With that, the entire 20 km elevated section of the project would become operational, she said.

Boon for passengers Trains will run from Koyambedu to St Thomas Mount, connecting with suburban train services at St Thomas Mount and with mofussil and other bus services at Koyambedu. Very soon, direct trains will be run on the loop line available at Alandur so that direct train connections can be provided from Koyambedu to the airport, without the passengers having to change at Alandur, she said.

The share of public transport in Chennai will be substantially enhanced with seamless integration of buses, suburban train services, air services, metro rail and eventually the monorail, she said.

Plan for walkalator Naidu took a ride in the metro rail from Airport to St Thomas Mount. Talking to newspersons on board the train, Naidu said his ministry is in talks with the Airports Authority of India to provide a ‘walkalator’ from the metro station to the airport terminals. This is important as it will be difficult for passengers carrying luggage to alight from the metro walk to the terminals or take the battery-operated cars. With the opening of the metro line from Little Mount to Airport, Chennai will now have around 19 km of metro operational out of the total 45 km of Chennai Metro Rail Project Phase 1.

Jayalalithaa has taken steps to provide integrated seamless travel facility from the Central bus stand to the airport. For this, the State government has provided ₹400 crore, he said.

Metro rail coverage With today’s inauguration, about 324 km of metro rail will be operational in the country in the cities of Delhi and NCR, Gurgaon, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru, Jaipur and Mumbai.

Around 520 km is presently under construction in various cities, including Delhi and NCR, Kolkata, Chennai, Jaipur, Mumbai, Kochi, Ahmedabad, Nagpur and Lucknow and another 553 km is under consideration, he said.

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