The footpath-less stretch of the IMG Junction-Infopark road where a woman pedestrian was fatally knocked down by a private bus recently.
| Photo Credit: H. VIBHU
Close on the heels of a decision to widen roads around the collectorate and to convert IMG Junction-Infopark road into a one-way corridor, IT professionals and others have demanded alternative greenfield road corridors to reach Infopark.
Around one lakh IT employees and innumerable others now commute along mostly congested roads to reach the IT hub. Pratidhwani, a welfare organisation of IT professionals that has been spearheading the demand for better road connectivity and public transport to Infopark, highlighted safety concerns arising from narrow, potholed roads and reckless driving by buses in Kochi and its suburbs.
This comes in the wake of a young woman getting killed after a speeding private bus rammed her at a narrow, footpath-less stretch on Infopark road on Wednesday (November 4, 2026).
‘Harrowing time’
“It is high time the Thrikkakara municipality, Public Works department, Kerala Road Fund Board, traffic police, and other agencies concerned woke up from their slumber, as IT professionals and others have been having a harrowing time over the past decade due to narrow roads and traffic snarls. This is particularly true of the Collectorate Junction-Infopark road and the Pallikkara-Athani road, where traffic congestion is acute. With buildings having come up on either side of these roads, parallel roads should be built through vacant plots. This will help convert many existing roads into one-way corridors. In addition, IMG Junction must be redesigned and a roundabout built, for which minimal land acquisition would be required. Overbridges or flyovers could also be built to bypass bottlenecked junctions,” said Jidheesh Rajan of Pratidhwani.
The aim is to rope in like-minded people and organisations in the matter. Apart from approaching the court, follow-up action would be taken in the form of campaigns, he added.
Urgent intervention sought
Sajan John, former chief operating officer of Kochi Water Metro Limited, sought the urgent intervention of government agencies to address traffic congestion and chaos on the 1.50-km-long IMG Junction-Infopark Carnival Junction corridor, which is used by tens of thousands of people daily, including by approximately 1 lakh Infopark employees. Similar is the plight of Kakkanad-Pallikara road and Athani Junction. In both corridors, vast tracts of vacant land are available behind buildings facing the road, and two-lane roads can be built parallel to the existing ones.
Welcoming a proposal to convert roads around the collectorate building as one-way corridors, Mr. John called for a comprehensive traffic re-arrangement plan in the IMG Junction-Signal Junction-Padamugal-NGO Quarters-Olimugal Junction corridor.
Published – November 10, 2026 06:20 am IST
