MS Railway Station Information and Trains for MS

"Chennai Egmore" (formerly known as "Madras Egmore") (station code: "MS") is a railway station in Chennai, India. Situated in the neighborhood of Egmore, it is one of the four intercity railway terminals in the city and the other three railway stations are Chennai Central Railway Station, Tambaram railway station and Chennai Beach railway station. The station was built in 1906-1908 as the terminus of the South Indian Railway Company. The building built in Gothic architecture style is one of the prominent landmarks of Chennai. The main entrance to the station is situated on Gandhi-Irwin Road and the rear entrance on EVR Periyar Salai.

The station was apparently constructed from 8679 on land purchased from Pulney Andy. The building is built in the Gothic style of architecture with imposing domes and corridors. It is one of the prominent landmarks of the city of Chennai. The recently opened northern entrance to this railway station is on the arterial Poonamallee High Road in Chennai city.

History says that the station was actually a fort, called the Egmore Redoubt, similar to Leith Castle, which is a part of Santhome. It is said that the station came up in a place that once used to store ammunition for the British.

The station building was constructed on a land, for which was acquired from S. Pulney Andy, an English physician, who, in his letter to the 'Collector of Madras,' initially refused to sell his property owing to the difficulty with which he had purchased and developed the property. However, the South Indian Railway (SIR) Company, which was then operating train services to the south, persuaded him to sell the land, for which Andy claimed as compensation. After acquiring the land, the SIR invited Henry Irwin, CIE (chief engineer), who did much of latter day Indo-Saracenic Revival architecture in Madras, and E. C. Bird, company architect, to design a building to suit the traffic need. After several alterations in the plan, the construction work began in September 1905 and was completed in 1908. It was constructed by contractor T. Samynada Pillai of thirunageswaram near kumbakonnam at a cost of . The station was officially opened on 11 June 1908.

There was initially a demand that the station be named after Robert Clive, which was, however, strongly opposed by the public as they wanted to name it Egmore. When the station was opened there was no electricity connection and a generator was used.

Earlier cars used to come inside the platform itself, which was found only in this station. In its report, the SIR commented on the construction of a new building for Egmore:

A new suburban station building was opened in November 2004 when the Tambaram-Beach broad gauge section became fully operational. With increasing passenger traffic, the entrance on the Gandhi-Irwin Road eventually became insufficient. In June 2006, the second entrance was opened. Its average daily earning is . Contracts for cleaning Chennai Egmore station has been awarded for a period of 3 years from 2010 for a value of .

The station has a train care centre named Egmore Railway Yard(GSN Yard - Gopal Samy Nagar), where the trains arriving at the station are prepared for departure. However, the centre is soiled and grimy due to lack of maintenance.

In April 2012, the Government Railway Police (GRP) and the Railway Protection Force (RPF) together launched a helpline known as ''Kaakum karangal'' (literally meaning 'Protecting hands') in the terminus. This involved dividing the terminus into three sectors and deploying 18 police personnel for security.

The main station has Closed-circuit television cameras installed. The suburban platforms are covered by the Integrated Security Surveillance System (ISSS) project implemented in 2012. The project, implemented jointly by the Southern Railways and HCL Technologies, includes installation of CCTV cameras that would record visuals around the clock and store the data for 30 days, with the footage transmitted and stored using an Internet Protocol system.

The station serves not only to the south but also to the north (Hyderabad Deccan railway station) and east (Howrah Junction railway station). Additionally, the Chennai - Mumbai Dadar Chennai Egmore Express (west) originates from the Egmore station.

As the growth potential at Chennai Egmore station is limited due to space constraint, the railway is planning to originate

terminate some of the additional trains to be introduced in future at Tambaram Railway Station. However, the station will remain a hub of train services and there is no proposal to shift all the services to Tambaram.

In February 2013, as part of a national initiative to eliminate ballast tracks at major stations, washable aprons—ballastless tracks

tracks on a concrete bed—were laid along the entire length of track of platform 2 at the terminus.

The station will also be connected to the Chennai Metro Rail Line 2, serving as an underground station.

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, Chennai Central Railway Station, Chennai Suburban Railway, Railway stations in Chennai, Heritage structures in Chennai