Chennais Storm Water Drains or SWD - 35 percent not ready for rains
Posted on: 19/Aug/2019 10:10:31 AM
To initiate steps for monsoon preparedness, and to de-silt canals, drains and waterways, Chennai residents have began urging GCC and PWD now after the rainfall.
Point to be noted is normally GCC commences de-silting of SWD or storm water drains and canals few months before the onset of northeast monsoons in October. It is now brought out by the residents that in this year many drains in important places have not been de-silted.
It has been pointed out by Mr. V. S. Jayaraman, representative of T. Nagar Residents Welfare Association that most of the roads in T. Nagar gets water logged. He added that many shopkeepers dump waste and most of the storm water rains in T. Nagar gets clogged due to this. It is worthy to note that there is no proper of drains to major waterways. In addition to this, storm water drains are also dysfunctional.
Mr. Jayaraman spoke about how the corporation must identify those who let sewage water into storm water drains. Information is food wastes dumped by many eateries in T. Nagar are causing problems. Point is GCC has been requested to take up de-silting of SWD in right earnest to make sure that the contractors do a clean job.
For the purpose of monitoring the work, GCC must rope in resident welfare associations or resident activists of streets. Most of the SWD in Usman Road and in other streets of T. Nagar are used for commercial establishments and mobile eateries to dump garbage and food waste. Hence a complete overhaul of SWDs in these places is very important. It is the work to the civic body to check the SWDs that are dry in non-rainy seasons but have sewage water. Action must be taken against those who let sewage into SWDS.
According to Mr. S. Mangala Raj, former corporation councillor, GCC has de-silted only VIP routes like Santhome High Road. Others like Lazarus Church Road and Mundakanniamman Koil Street have not been de-silted. He added that the delay in construction of SWD along many roads has been leading to overflow or flooding in many localities.
According to Mr. S. Janakiraman, former professor at the Madras Institute of Development Studies, Chennai city’s drainage network was not prepared for the northeast monsoon but expected later in 2019. He revealed that thousands of kilometres of SWD were choked and spoke about how for Chennai city as a whole lessons were not learnt from the past. He hinted about the need to have structural changes in the drain network that takes care of all the water bodies.
The civic agencies have failed to modify certain elevated sections of rivers like Adyar even after the 2015 floods. Mr. Janakiraman concluded that the elevated portion along Adyar River caused flooding in Ekkatuthangal.
