Chennai Central - "Gateway of the South"

Chennai Central, formerly known as Madras Central is the main railway terminus in Chennai. It is home to the Southern Railways and the most important rail hub in South India. Trains from here connect the city to other states of India, while trains to other parts of Tamil Nadu (excluding Tiruchirapalli, Madurai and Tirunelveli) are catered to by the Chennai Egmore station. Chennai Central is the main hub for the Chennai suburban railway. The building of the railway station, one of the landmarks of Chennai, was designed by the architect Henry Irwin.

This station is also noted for a whole range of amenities available within the premises. The station has book-shops, restaurants, accommodation, Internet browsing centers and even an essential commodities shopping mall.In 2005, the buildings were painted to a creamy yellow color, but concurring with the views of a campaign by citizens of Chennai and also to retain the old nostalgic charm, they were painted back to their original brick-red color, which was how the buildings were built originally.

Chennai Central serves as a symbolic landmark for people in South India as this served as the main gateway for all people who travelled to South India during British times. Chennai Central has been greatly instrumental in earning Chennai the famous sobriquet "Gateway of the South".

Madras Central was built in 1873 at Parktown as a second terminus to decongest the Royapuram harbour station which was being utilised for port movements. Built in the Gothic Revival style, the original station was designed by George Hardinge and consisted of just four platforms. The station was later modified with the addition of the central clock tower and other changes by Robert Fellowes Chisholm. The redesign was eventually completed in 1900.

Madras Central gained prominence after the beach line was extended further south in 1907 and Royapuram was no longer a terminus for Madras. All trains were then terminated at Madras Central instead and its position was further strengthened after the construction of the headquarters of the Madras and Southern Maratha Railway (erstwhile Madras Railway and now known as the Southern Railway (India)) adjacent to it in 1922.

Chennai is the headquarters of the Southern Railway zone of the Indian Railways.This station has 11 platforms to handle long distance trains and 3 platforms exclusively for suburban trains. The complex for suburban trains is popularly known as the Moore Market complex. There is a platform 2A between platforms 2 and 3; it is used to handle relatively short trains like the Rajdhani Exp., Vijayawada Jan Shatabdi, Bangalore/Mysore Shatabdis and the Gudur Passenger.

Chennai Central used to have trains with special liveries until early 90's. The Brindavan Exp. used to have green livery with a yellow stripe running above and below the windows; Nilgiri Exp. (popularly known as Blue Mountain) had blue livery. All trains now have the standard blue livery (denoting Air-Braked bogies. Notable exceptions include the Rajdhani, Shatabdi, Jan Shatabdi and Saptagiri/Tirupati Exp., which poses a vivid green / cream livery combination with a matching WAM4 6PE loco from Arakkonam(AJJ) electric loco shed.

The building to the west of the railway station is the Ripon building, which houses the Chennai Corporation. To the east of the station lies the Southern Railway headquarters.

-D Thangamani
www.theflame.in