The Madurai Junction is one of the 1,318 stations short-listed for redevelopment under the Amrit Bharat Station Scheme (ABBS).
Revamped Madurai station to showcase city's historical, cultural aspects. (Wikipedia)
Several historic and cultural aspects of Madurai including those from the Pandya dynasty will be part of the redeveloped Madurai railway station. Construction work on the new station will go on till November 2025. It will promote the city’s culture and heritage, the Southern Railway said.
The Madurai Junction is one of the 1,318 stations short-listed for redevelopment under the Amrit Bharat Station Scheme (ABBS).
“The entrance of the station will resemble the Gopuram of the Meenakshi temple. It has great historical, architectural and religious significance. The interiors will have paintings of fishes (emblem of the Pandya dynasty) and other heritage symbols,” Deputy Chief Engineer, Madurai Division, R Nand Gopal, said.
He added that Jallikattu is a traditional and important sporting event in Madurai. Representing that, the station will have a statue of a bull at the entrance hall.
The east terminal building will have three floors. There will be offices and passenger amenities on the ground floor. The railway offices will be on the mezzanine floor, and the air-concourse on the first floor. The retiring rooms and commercial spaces will be on the second floor.
Gopal said that the station, at present, handles 96 trains a day. It registers an average daily passenger footfall of 51,296. Scores of tourists from across the country and abroad use the station, he added.
“We studied the increase in passenger footfall over the last 10 years. We realised that the annual growth is between one to two per cent. Going by that calculation, 40 years from now the footfall will be double at about 1 lakh. We are creating amenities keeping this in mind,” he said.
Asked what would be the revenue model to meet operation costs, Gopal said instead of increasing prices for various facilities, the railways aims to generate revenues from commercial spaces.
“Besides train passengers, the station will attract other people as its commercial spaces will have (stores of) big brands and eateries,” he said.
Other facilities include three multi-level parking facilities, multi-modal connectivity such as subways to connect the Periyar bus station and the Madurai Railway station, skywalks with escalators and lifts, and foot-over bridges for movement of passengers and parcels.
According to the Southern Railway, it had awarded the work of redeveloping the station on September 22, 2022, on contract to M/s P&C Projects Private Limited, Chennai, at ₹347.47 crore, setting a time-frame of 36 months for the project’s completion.
“M/s TUV India Private Limited, Mumbai, has been tasked with the work of project management services (PMS) at ₹10.88 crore. The PMS consultant is responsible for monitoring the project,” Gopal said.
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