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Durga quickened her pace as she got off the bus at Chennai’s Guindy neighbourhood and walked towards the Guindy railway station to catch a suburban train to reach her office located in Thyagaraya Nagar, also called T Nagar, some six kilometres away. “I’m going to be late. My salary could be cut,” Durga, an accountant in a private company, told Down To Earth (DTE).
Every morning, she leaves home at 8 am to catch a bus from her residence in Thiruvanmiyur to Guindy before she boards the suburban train. “If I leave the office by 6 pm, I typically arrive home around 9 pm. My total travel time to and from work is around four hours every day, covering a distance of 22 kilometres to and fro,” she explained.
Durga is often accompanied by her colleague, Ezhil Arasu, who also finds the daily commute draining. In the morning, she walks a kilometre, then takes a shared auto, a bus and a suburban train to reach her office in T Nagar. "I was late to work a few days last month and lost a day’s salary," Arasu shared, as she entered the overcrowded train that arrived at around 10 am, panicking that she would be late again.
Though they have the option of taking at least two buses all the way to T Nagar, the duo avoids doing so due to traffic congestion. “The suburban train is a lifesaver as it takes us only 7-10 minutes from Guindy to T Nagar,” said Durga, who spends Rs 1,500 a month on commuting. “If I take a bus for the same distance, we’ll see plenty of traffic along the way, especially in Saidapet. A bus ride typically takes at least 30 minutes,” she noted, adding that the suburban train station is just a short walk from where she works.
For Amburaj, who lives 40 km away from his office in Chetpet, commuting is relatively less burdensome. He parks his two-wheeler at the railway station, paying Rs 15 a day, then boards the suburban train to his office. “It takes me an hour to reach my destination, but the cost is only Rs 20 a day,” he told DTE. "If I were to take a bus, my travel time would increase by 30 minutes and I’d have to shell out Rs 110 a day.” He said that he finds it too tiring to ride his bike all the way to his workplace. Given the distance, he has considered moving closer to his workplace, but “cannot afford living in Chetpet”.
The Southern Railways Chennai Division runs the suburban train and the Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS). The latter runs on an elevated stretch for most of its length. These services facilitate swift movement of passengers within cities, suburbs and extended suburbs in a 150 km radius.
The suburban rail services began in 1931, connecting Tambaram and Chennai Beach, and MRTS was flagged off in 1995.
The suburban sector operates 700 services daily. These include 244 services in the Chennai Beach-Tambaram section (in which Guindy and T Nagar fall), 230 services in the Chennai Central-Tiruvallur section and 86 in the Chennai Central-Gummidipoondi section, according to the 2019 Comprehensive Mobility Plan (CMP), a long-term vision for transportation in Chennai developed by Chennai Unified Metropolitan Transport Authority (CUMTA), the nodal agency for urban transport in Chennai.
The busiest suburban rail line, it said, was the Chennai Beach-Tambaram line, which has a peak demand of around 24,000 passengers per hour per direction. The MRTS operates from Chennai Beach to Velachery with 140 services.
“Chennai has the second largest suburban ridership after Mumbai. The ridership is in the order of around 1.2 million per day in the city. They have existed for a very long time and they continue to have patronage,” said Shreya Gadepalli, founder and managing trustee of UrbanWorks, a non-profit institute based in Chennai. “The benefit of suburban rail is that they are not affected by traffic congestion and are affordable.”
MRTS helps people residing along the Chennai Beach to Velachery stretch. Nandini, who lives in Choolai, relies on MRTS services to commute to her workplace in Thiruvanmiyur, a distance of roughly 16 km. She finds this mode of transport safe, economical and convenient.
It takes her 25 minutes to reach the station, spending Rs 120 per month. From the station, it’s a convenient 10-minute walk to her office, thanks to the recently renovated footpath. “It was extremely difficult and unsafe to walk before that,” she added.
Lakshmi, a makeup artist, also prefers taking the MRTS if her clients are located along the train route. She cited the same reasons as Nandini, particularly appreciating the time she saves avoiding traffic congestion. However, as her work requires her to travel across Chennai, she often ends up taking an auto.
Suburban trains have seen an increase in ridership, unlike buses. The 2019 CMP reported a rise in the share of trips by train from 5 per cent in 2008 to 5.6 per cent in 2018. As per studies, low fare in comparison to other modes of transport has been cited as one of the main reasons for relatively higher ridership in suburban trains.
The MRTS, however, is not without its problems. When DTE visited the Thiruvanmiyur MRTS station, the escalator was in poor condition, with paint wearing off in certain places.
“It is importance ensure the sustenance of the rail system in the present and long term; the infrastructure needs to be improved to make it more accessible and attractive for all users with better maintenance, lighting, commercial spaces and other design elements,” Venugopal AV, programme manager for Healthy Streets & Partnerships at ITDP India, an organisation that offers technical support on sustainable mobility initiatives in India.
Further, MRTS has not addressed the city’s traffic problem, the 2019 CMP report highlighted. “The ridership has increased over the years but the problem of congestion remains the same as the growth of vehicles has seen a 10-fold increase from 0.5 million vehicles in 1992 to 5.7 million in 2018. Despite significant rail investments, including the MRTS and the Chennai Metro, the rail mode’s share has remained low at around 5 percent,” the authors of the report added.
This year, the Southern Railways introduced air-conditioned trains along the suburban route. The rates range from Rs 35-60. Only three trains ply every day from Chennai Beach to Tambaram on weekdays and two on weekends. When DTE visited the T Nagar station in May, the train looked largely empty. “The AC train is not frequent and so I don’t take it,” Aarti Karthikeyan, a bank employee, said.
Back in 2007, the government had proposed extending the MRTS route from Velachery to St Thomas Mount. This project has not been completed yet.
Gadepalli does not see a scope in expanding the rail network. “There are only few cities that have managed their public transport through railways alone,” she said, explaining that increasing bus fleet will help.
Venugopal concurred. “Expanding the rail system is cost intensive and long-term. Rather, we should improve the quality and frequency of services and invest in increasing the first- and last-mile connectivity to nudge more users to take up train services,“ he said.
The 2019 CMP report pointed out another problem: Lack of intermodal integration. Chennai city has different modes of transportation such as bus, suburban trains, metro and intermediate public transport systems (auto-rickshaws, shared autos, taxi services) but there is no integration among them.
“Alongside the need to improve each transportation system, the focus should also be on the multimodal integration for users to have a seamless transfer,” Venugopal said. This, he added, could also enhance accessibility, reduce congestion and improve overall urban mobility for the residents of Chennai.
Further, it has been reported that the Chennai Metro Rail Ltd is awaiting an in-principle approval from the Railway Board (Union Ministry of Railways) for the takeover of MRTS. This is expected to improve MRTS’ integration with Chennai metro, as per the 2025 World Bank report Chennai’s Urban Mobility Transformation.
This article is part of our series on how India moves, which looks at the relationship between air quality and human mobility in cities and towns. This story is the second of the Chennai mobility series. Also read the first, third, fourth and fifth parts.