Dont miss the tree for the road !!!

‘Killer tree road’, ‘Scrape turn’, ‘Chilra corner’ — Third Avenue in Besant Nagar seems to have many monikers. And all of them given by people who have had near-death experiences on it. Third Avenue, which runs alongside Theosophical Society, is a beautiful tree-lined stretch — but two trees are right on the road at a sharp curve. Many motorists swerving to avoid the massive trees have had serious accidents. On May 2, around 7 pm, a group of friends crashed head-on into the tree. Pavit Singh, the 21-year-old driver, died on the spot. R Ganesh Krish, a 23-year-old motorcycle enthusiast and a friend of Pavit’s, says he has had two bike accidents on the stretch, one in 2004 and another in 2007. “I was badly injured the second time,” says Ganesh, adding that the avenue is called ‘chilra corner’ by the locals because there are so many accidents, “it’s almost like loose change”. “I call it the killer tree,” says 35-year-old Arjun Shankar, who crashed into it late at night on February 23 this year when he swerved to avoid another vehicle. “The trunk of the tree grows at an angle on the road and it’s difficult to avoid,” says Arjun, who is still recovering from a skull fracture, cerebral edema, sub dural haematoma and facial fractures that resulted from the accident. The traffic police have placed speed limit signs, reflectors, speed breakers, and warning signs at the curve, but Sunday’s accident has them on the aggressive. They have started a drive to create awareness on the importance of wearing seat belts and another drive to get the tree cut down. “Around two months ago, we recommended to the Corporation that the tree be cut. But residents of the area filed a public interest litigation against it, so nothing has been done,” says M Ravi, Additional Commissioner of Police, Chennai Traffic. “After Sunday’s incident, I have written another letter to the Corporation to have the tree cut.” While traffic police insist that Sunday’s was the first reported accident on this stretch in the last six months, residents of the area have a different story. Businessman K Subramanian, who has been living on Third Avenue for five years, says he sees at least one accident on the curve every weekend. “Kids race along this stretch at night. Every weekend I can hear them screeching past, and every weekend, there’s a fall,” he says. His son Krishnan admits to watching the races from his terrace on Saturday nights between 10 pm and 11 pm. “We also see the police stopping and fining some of them, but it seems to make no difference,” says Subramanian. Abizer Lehry, 30, an IT professional, says he is a much wiser and safer rider now but in his younger days, he had his own spills there. “It’s a favourite scraping turn for thrill-seeking bikers. They love to take the turn at high speeds with their knees scraping the ground. There’s something about that turn that makes you want to open up the throttle. Of course, I’m older and wiser now,” says Abizer.

-sources TIMESOFINDIA