Bangalore - Ramanagaram MEMU Services

This whole "creeping approach" to Namma Railu, about the viability of which even a 5th standard student will readily vouch, is far from satisfactory.

What is worrisome here is if all of this is a ploy to eventually declare the operations unviable because of poor ridership, and therewith scuttle Namma Railu. I can't make any other sense of these one-off operations, that too at such odd timings. I hope and pray I am wrong.

The recently introduced special Diesel Electric Multiple Unit (DEMU) train service from the city to Ramanagaram has been eliciting poor response, much to the dismay of railway authorities. Unless, there is more public patronage, the service runs the risk of being stopped on its tracks.

- - - As per information available from the time the train made its first run on June 9, till July 20, it has witnessed a mere 45 per cent seating occupancy in the onward direction. The return trip at 6.35 pm from Ramanagaram to the City station, which reaches at 7.50 pm, saw an occupancy rate of around 28 per cent.

- - - The DRM said they will wait a little more to see if the service picks up or if the train timing needs to be revised so that more commuters can make use of it. Divisional Operations Manager Soundararajan said the DEMU service will eventually be withdrawn if this trend continues.

- - - Additional Divisional Railway Manager Sunanda Arul felt the service had just commenced its run and must be given more time to become popular.

Officials were also contemplating giving it wide publicity to help it get a better crowd.

For the full text of the report in the New Indian Express, click here

This was quite the worry I had expressed on 10th July (scroll up to read the post captioned "creeping approach"). Now, actually, a 45% occupancy for a just commenced, poorly advertised, not-so-properly timed service is not bad by any standard at all.

However, more importantly, the one-off service is not quite the same as a "commuter service". The idea of the (cost-effective, fast and frequent) commuter service is to incentivise relocation of sections of the population to the out-lying townships, in order to de-congest the city. The state has the biggest stake in achieving this outcome, and consequently, it needs to play the lead role (more than IR) in making it happen.

If the scheme is implemented to its fullest scope, you'll see the trains running to full capacity within a matter of months, even with realistic pricing of tickets. In fact, it can be a money spinner for IR too.

Sanjeev, Yeshwantpur is not a major bottleneck for commuters, it is lot closer to Majestic and there are many ways to get there. Already Reach 3 Metro is also active and once Phase 1 Metro is fully online, it will be even more easily accessible.

What pains the most is Whitefield. It might take another 5-10 years to get Metro till whitefield. It will be real pain to reach Whitefield with the ever increasing IT working population using private transport especially large single occupancy cars. It makes more sense to have Whitefield / Malur / Bangarpet - Ramanagaram MEMU.

Let IR move some of the trains originating in SBC to Yelahanka or Yeshwantpur.

There was a debate on Metro or BRTS between Silkboard to Hebbal. BMRCL is asking DULT to hold on BRTS since they plan for Metro in that reach in Phase 3. This would be too late to implement, since phase 2 is going to take 5 more years, phase 3 might take another 10 years. BRTS is a low hanging fruit which is more sustainable. Just taking the example of Delhi which had not implemented BRTS, but just bus lanes, we will never come out of Jams in Eastern Bangalore.

Curious to know why train# 66536 which leaves Ramnagar@6:50AM reaches Bengaluru @ 8:40AM? Journey around 1hr 50 mins. Is it an oversight or due to non-availability of rakes? 

Also, it would be good have an evening train from Whitefield to Bengaluru with a connecting train to Ramnagar. For Eg:, if a train from Whitefield reaches Bengaluru by around 19:45, people can use train# 66539 to board towards Ramnagar.

- Srivatsan