Chennai Metro Begins Trial Runs Between Alandur & Airport

On Friday, the Chennai Metro Rail Ltd. started trial runs on the 5.1 km Alandur – Airport stretch of the 32.1 km Wimco Nagar – Airport line! This set of trial runs are part of the Speed Certification process which the CMRL had announced about earlier this month. Other details about this development (number of trains & scheduled duration) are unavailable at the moment, and the CMRL’s otherwise fantastic Facebook page has been awfully quiet about it.

File image of a trial run on Alandur – Koyambedu held in 2015 – source: friendsofchennai

Alignment of the Airport – Alandur section – view Chennai Metro map & information

This section includes 4 stations at Alandur, Nanganallur Road (OTA), Meenambakkam & the Airport. A small 600m section of it has been built underground between Nanganallur Road & Meenambakkam as it lies on the flight path of planes coming in to land on the secondary runway – view details & images.

Here’s a video from the local News 7 Tamil channel:

Update: Here’s another video from Dinamalar:

Flyers at Chennai’s Airport also noticed the trial run. Here are some images of a train pulling into the Airport station:

Photo Copyright: Bharanitharan J

Photo Copyright: Bharanitharan J

Update 2:

Spotted at Kathipara junction – Photo Source: The Hindu epaper

In March, the CMRL had operated an OHE maintenance vehicle to check for visual obstructions (see details and images here) and has since used it for configuring the OHE system. Trial runs are now expected to be extended northward to Little Mount in the coming weeks which’ll add another 3 km to the section being tested.

For more updates, check out the Chennai section of the The Metro Rail Guy!

– TMRG