North South Difference in Madurai

As you know Madurai is a city grown around the important temple Madurai Meenakshi Temple, and the same time there has been a river cutting across the developing/developed city of Madurai. That river is Vaigai River.

Just as a fact, Meenakshi Temple is in the southern side of the river. The river cuts through the city. Given this cut through of the river, the city gets divided into two.

I don't know how this was handled in the king periods about crossing the river and going from south to north of the city or vice versa. But, as I know right from the British period, there had been bridges connecting the two divides of the city. Even recently there had been many additions to the bridges connecting the divide, due to more traffic and more vehicles etc.,. There had been no issues today with the traffic as such crossing these areas. That is because enough bridges are there connecting these two regions.

All said, if you ask any Madurai person, they can spot differences between these two areas/regions of Madurai. I am not dividing it as North and South of Madurai, but I just want to spot some differences between these two places.

Most of the developments had been done only in the north. Most of the major offices, corporations, hotels, institutions, bus stands are only in the northern side of the city. It is not the fault of any corporation or government, but it is just happening like that. Northern part is growing in terms of Bangalore, Chennai etc., Hence the connecting part is North of Madurai, hence the improvement I guess.

Even with the shops, malls, and all kinds of eateries etc., are more in northern side of Madurai. Is there a reason? Yes, little more educated or little more wealthy people stay in northern side like Anna Nagar etc., Hence there is difference in the lifestyle between north and south. Even most of the companies start only in the northern side of Madurai.

You can clearly see the difference as soon as you cross the river and reach Goripalayam and cross like Anna Nagar, KK Nagar etc., If any future projects, I would request Government to also add it to southern side, so that there is a gradual growth of Madurai.

This article is not to divide Madurai, but to geographically see what is the difference in different cross sections of Madurai and help Government/Officials to spot locations for future projects in Madurai.

Hope this was helpful and the intention is not to divide or anything like that!