Chennai Metro Rail awaits Southern Railway approval to begin tunnelling at Villivakkam

Chennai Metro Rail Limited (CMRL) has been awaiting the approval from Southern Railway to construct the underground network between Villivakkam Bus Terminus to Villivakkam for the phase 2 project. CMRL has now taken up this issue with the Project Monitoring Group, created by the Union government to solve bottlenecks in infrastructure projects.

This stretch, a small section of corridor 5 from Madhavaram to Sholinganallur, has been way behind schedule. It has suffered delays since the first tender, floated a few years ago to construct an underground network, had to be cancelled since the prospective bidder placed exorbitant quotes.