No Diwali rush as 3L board buses home from city

No Diwali rush as 3L board buses home from city

Ram.Sundaram@timesgroup.com

Chennai:14.11.2020

A day ahead of Diwali, more than three lakh people left the city for their native places in government buses on Friday, but there was no mad rush at the Koyambedu bus terminus and other bus pickup points unlike the previous years.

The Tamil Nadu transport department announced that 1,580 special buses will be operated in addition to the 2,000 regular bus services from Chennai on Friday.

Of these, 2,438 buses were operated till 8pm, including 611 special buses. “Other buses will be operated based on demand. Given the trend, we don’t feel the need to operate more buses,” said a State Express Transport Corporation (SETC) official.

Enough buses will ply to ferry all the 92,800 people who have reserved tickets online. SETC expects at least four lakh people to have left the city by the end of the day.

Last year, around 6.7 lakh people left the city in buses. “This year, even when there were not enough trains due to Covid restrictions, fewer people commuted. This could be because either people stayed back in Chennai or left a day earlier in order to avoid rush,” the SETC official said.

Thermal scanners were in place at all entry points in Koyambedu and no passenger was allowed to board a bus without a mask.

Most of the private buses travelling to distant places such as Madurai, Coimbatore or Tirunelveli had left the city on Thursday. The ticket fee was 50% higher than the usual fare on Friday but the crowd was thinner with demand high only to nearby places such as Vellore or Salem which can be reached within 6 hours, said Karthick, a private bus operator.

A transport department official said complaints received on helpline were addressed and cases were booked against private buses for fleecing passengers.

Late evening rain resulted in water stagnation on roads causing traffic congestion in Tambaram and West Anna Nagar. “There were not enough police at the Thirumangalam signal to manage the traffic,” said R Sadish, who reached the bus terminus after a 30-minute delay.

Demand for taxis was very high with few drivers signing in for duty. Autorickshaw drivers made a killing with fares from Anna Nagar to Koyambedu being Rs 200, 50% more than usual.

SMOOTH RUN: The usual Diwali rush was missing at Koyambedu. Officials said people might have left for their native places