Kolkata: Over 100 mm rain in less than one-and-a-half hours on Thursday afternoon inundated thoroughfares across the city uprooting trees and crippling traffic system. Storm water entered major hospitals such as SSKM, RG Kar Medical College, Belle Vue Clinic causing hardships for the patients and the medicos. Storm water also entered Bidhan Sabha Bhawan, Lalbazar and other government and private offices and remained for longer hours with the Kolkata Municipal Corporation struggling to flush out storm water from flooded streets.The KMC sewerage and drainage department had to combat waterlogging of several major streets that went under water after a downpour. Jetting cum suction machines were doing rounds on Chittaranjan Avenue, Ultadanga Main Road, Bidhan Sarani, AJC Bose Road, Park Street, Camac Street, JL Nehru Road, Asutosh Mukherjee Road, SP Mukherjee Road, Rashbehari Avenue, Gariahat Road among other areas.Severe waterlogging across several low-lying areas of Kolkata left vehicular movement crippling and triggering massive traffic congestion on major arterial roads during peak evening hours. The worst hit were school and college goers trying to return home.The affected corridors, included CR Avenue, Mahatma Gandhi Road, AJC Bose Road, Sarat Bose Road, Syed Amir Ali Avenue, and Ashutosh Mukherjee (ATM) Road. Other key roads like Camac Street, Amherst Street, College Street, Alipore Road, Theatre Road, and Park Street also reported inundation and related slowing down of vehicles immediately after the rains receded.The travel corridor connecting central and north Kolkata emerged as the worst affected zone. On Central Avenue and Amherst Street, water accumulation forced traffic into a single lane for several hours, causing long vehicular queues.Commuters using elevated corridors faced similar gridlocks. Traffic flow on the Maa Flyover and AJC Bose Road dropped significantly, with the average transit time increasing to over 40 minutes along these stretches.Furthermore, structural spillover compounded the transit crisis. Substantial waterlogging on Theatre Road choked the connecting links, which directly hit vehicle movement on Park Street. Traffic police personnel were deployed at major intersections to drain water and redirect vehicles, but the high volume of peak-hour traffic slowed down recovery efforts across the city.The very heavy rainfall resulted in severe waterlogging on several stretches across Sector V and Salt Lake. In many places in Salt Lake, the drains were overflowed as excess storm water flowed and entered many households, inundating the driveways and common passages.“It rained heavily for over an hour as water flowed back and entered our houses and touched almost the first step of the staircase just after entering our house. This has happened after a long time,” said Debarati Sanyal, a resident of Salt Lake AE block.Several pockets and thoroughfares across Salt Lake including Karunamoyee, around City Centre mall, blocks surrounding Salt Lake stadium and stretches of First Avenue were waterlogged. The Bidhannagar Municipal Corporation authorities deployed workers to open gully pits and clean up the drainage lines to flush out storm water.Several stretches in Sector V were heavily inundated following the heavy rains as the Nabadiganta Industrial Township Authority operated additional portable pumps to flush out excess stormwater as much as possible at the earliest.
