ALANDUR IS CITY’S ARAKKONAM

ALANDUR IS CITY’S ARAKKONAM

Madras By The Metro Is A Metaphor For What Chennai Is, An Intriguing Mix Of The Old And The New. We Hop On The City’s Newest Mode Of Transport And Hop Off At A Few Stations Along The Way To Wander Through Streets That Tell Us Stories Of What Went Before And How Life Goes On

Kamini.Mathai@timesgroup.com

05.09.2021

All roads may lead to Rome, but as far as the Chennai metro goes, all rails lead to Alandur. At a little over 35 metres, the elevated Arignar Anna Alandur Metro, the “interchange station” between the two metro lines in the city — the Blue Wimco Nagar-Airport line and the Green Chennai Central-St Thomas Mount — isn’t just the city’s first multi-level railway station, and its tallest, but is also the only station where passengers from the two corridors can swap routes.

You could say it’s the metro counterpart of Southern Railway’s Arakkonam junction, one of the oldest junctions in the country that links major cities. And like Arakkonam, which for most travellers is more a transit point than a destination, Alandur too gets missed in the dash of the daily commute.

Alandur was the chosen one, explains R Ramanathan, former director (projects), Chennai Metro Rail. How could it not be, when the nodal hub connects to north Madras, south Madras, GST Road, Koyambedu, and the airport. It also had enough space to spare, both horizontally and vertically.

But is there more to Alandur?

Just by looking out that metro train window, we can tell you there is. A battleground, for starters. We don’t just mean the constituency, from where M G Ramachandran made his electoral debut in 1967 (although it was called Parangimalai then), but an actual battlefield. History buffs, while on the metro, one of the spots you’re likely to pass near Alandur junction is the OTA golf course, which was once the spot where a battle unfolded in 1759. It was here that the French under Thomas Arthur, Count of Lally, lost to British troops commanded by Major-General Stringer Lawrence.

The battlefield now doubles up as a golf course as well as a tactical training field for budding army officers. It’s pretty much off-limits in terms of walking in, but hey, you can catch a glimpse on the metro, and that’s free.

Architect and artist Srishti Prabakar, who has done sketch walks in Alandur, calls the area a juxtaposition of worlds past and present. “On the one hand, you have the old world chaos of the market, the bustle of people bargaining over their fish, haggling over why their pomfret looked fleshier the previous week. On the other, you have the swanky metro, and then you notice all of it set against the backdrop of the majestic St Thomas Mount. It’s a junction of not just the metros but of the city’s culture and history.”

Every time the sketch-walk group ambles up to Alandur, says Srishti, they end up spending most of their time soaking in the marvel of the metro station. “Being so elevated it’s beautiful to see the train almost emerging out of thin air, hills, and trees in the background.”

Now, if you’re game for a wander, a little away from the metro station is the St Thomas Garrison Church, incidentally No.1 GST Road. Constructed for less than ₹50,000, the church was opened in 1830. The church with its bomb-proof roof is now a heritage monument under the Archaeological Survey of India.

This was also the spot that Lieutenant-Colonel William Lambton, British soldier and surveyor, began his Great Trigonometrical Survey of India in 1802, a study that ended near Everest.

Well, who would have thought… even the Everest tracks to Alandur!