Last Wednesday Praja Team took a weekday train trip to Hosur. This trip was organized by our Namma Railu Team anchor Sanjeev. Here is a brief report on this trip. Hope you all will analyze and comment accordingly.
Myself along with our friend M A Siraj (journalist) reached Hebbal Station at 6:10 am itself to catch the YH1 train (Yeswantpur to Hosur) train @ 6:40 am. We were kind of the first passengers to be at Hebbal Station. Siraj had a brief conversation with the Station Master asking some basic questions. Little later Sathya and Sanjeev joined us.
About 35-40 passengers boarded the train. Half of them seems to be daily travelers and rest regular passengers. The bogie/compartment in which we all 4 boarded looked like a perfect commuter rail train. Myself and Sanjeev did a walk through in teh compartment to guage the occupancy. We did talked to quite a few passengers who happen to be the daily commuters going towards Anekal Road, Karamelam stations to reach offices in Electronic city and the vicinity.
Next Station was Banaswadi and we could see a large number of high rise apartments were located around Banaswadi Station. Sanjeev was of the opinion that if proper BMTC would help the people in the locality in great deal. About 80-90 people boarded the train at B'wadi.
We both got down and went to the other compartment and met many commuters there. We also met a group of women daily commuters going to Hosur. At Anekal and Karamelam station, many going to EC got down. Certainly with good last mile connectivity to EC would boost the ridership and convenience to the commuters.
AT Anekal Road, train had to wait for a crossing to the Dharampuri to City Station to CB Pur Train. The train looked almost full and many of them were daily travelers.
Finally we reached Hosur, got down @ 8:10 AM. Took a coffee break untill the Engine was reversed and connected to the train for Hosur to B'lore trip.
The return trip started at 8:40 AM towards Yeswantpur. All compartments were almost 60-70% full. We spoke to some of the dedicated daily travelers who were going towards Hebbal. They all narrated how they have lobied for continuing this service after the initial train run. Every body seems to agree with one thing that a regular commuter Service is a necessity and will help the people a great deal from all walks of life. They indicated that on Tuesdays all the traders would take the trip to b'lore to buy the goods and bring it back to Hosur and nearby places.
Overall it was a good trip and more so for gauging the ridership on Weekday. It was evident almost about 250-300 people take this service in each direction for their daily commute. this is in addition to about 100-150 by the non-regular passengers. This is in scenario where the last mile connectivity is still a dream. Most rely on autos and own vehicles.
We met a first time daily commuter - Satish from Creative. He was taking the train to reach EC. He was very appreciative of the Praja campaigns and promised to connect to the other enthusiast like him.
Sanjeev, Sathya can add more to this.
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Comments
Can we use more of FB and Twitter to reach out to more people
Hi,
To say this, I know, I am also at fault that I am not doing much to involve that much into the CRS initiative for sometime because of being very much busy from some time.
As I have earlier also mentioned that, we should have to reach more and more public and let them know the alternate options available for their daily commute, and surprisingly those alternate options are quick, reliable and least tiring.
We may meet once just to strategize this as to how to reach more and more people by -
- Informing more and more people about the existing daily services (I am sure majority doesn't know even about the existence of the service)
- Conveying the advantages of this mode to their regular transport mode.
- Make them spread the word to their friends and thus to more and more tech savvy people as well as non tech savvy.
These will give us more and more hands to demand better services Praja has been asking for a long long time. But I think, now we need more and more people to be aware of it, using it and demanding more and better services in and around it which may involve better frequency as well as BMTC connectivity to the railways stations.
Deepak
Service used by many folks including IT people in Manytha Tech
People working arround Sarjapur Road, Karmelaram, Hosur, Hebbal, Traders going to Yesvanthpur yard and public travelling to Anekal are using with last mile connectivity problem and poor maintainence of Stations.
Its was good trip with Syed, Sathya & Siraj.
We could able to see Byaippanhalli METRO Station on the way, it was jsut 300 Mts from the Hosur Track but no integration.
Belandur station to ORR
Hi,
While we can continue to followup with BMTC for last mile connectivity, I am looking for fellow passangers on YH-1 & HY-2 getting down at Belandur Road station to join hands and make our own arrangements to travel to/from ORR offices from Kadubeesanahalli to Sarjapur Road. If interested, drop me a mail.
PS: The timings of the train seems to have been changed a bit. On Banaswadi station the board now has a paper patch saying YH-1 Departure at 7:06 AM.
Sanjay
One more stop
There should be one more stop between Belandur road and Bypanahalli.
Local trains from bangalore
There are many other trains which connect BLR with near by towns eg 1)Bangalore -Marikuppam (enroute are KR puram,Whitefield,Bangarapet).Crowded train used for transporting vegetables, flowers etc 2) Mysore locals- many 3) Chickballapur.
If this is to be used for regular commuting instead of cars/buses etc then the frequency will need to more.
Rgds,
Shashidhar