Talking the popular subject of cramped commutes, in the middle of cribs and geek talk, we never put out our visions, Our vision, as in the end result if some things we wish for were to come true. Yes, no city level technical gyan etc - personal dreams. Let me start with my route.
Facts first.
- I live in Whitefield. My office - Bagmane Tech Park?
- Take my car to work 90% of the times. Carpool or bus the rest of time.
- Why car? Takes less time than the bus. Bike is other option, family wont let me, as it is deemed unsafe.
- I hate to drive, hate to operate the car. Useless peice of metal, depreciating asset by the day, and hassle to maintain in general.
- 13 kilometer commute takes an average of 40-50 minutes. That is avg speed of 15-19 km/h
So what do I want? Predictable time everyday. Happy with 30-35 mins.
Scenario 1a, 1b
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- Bicycle/Walk up to nearest bus stand on Varthur Road (5 mins)
- Next bus to HAL Airport - 15 mins
- 5 mins wait + Shuttle to office 10 mins total 15 mins
- Or Bicycle this part (once in a while) - 15 mins
- All done in 35 mins
Scenario 2. Yes, we all love trains. So:
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- Walk up to Varthur Road bus stand. (5 mins)
- Bus to Marathahalli (5-10 mins)
- Catch next local to C V Raman Nagar Station !! (10 mins)
- Take a quick shuttle to Bagmane Tech Park (5-10 mins)
- All done in 30-35 mins.
PS: 1 is very doable. And so is 2 many people say.
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Marathahalli Station?
Oh yes. This is sort of a proxy post to revive that old Commuter Rail Service talk.
To continue the dream - this is where Marathahalli station is, right behind the church.
CV Raman Nagar or Kaggadaspura station?
Probably here. who cares - kaggadasapura or CV Raman Nagar as long as shuttles take me you to the nearby area.
The neglected child
Lets see how it works for me if I used ORR.
Residence in Sanjaynagar, Office in either Electronic City or ITPL depending on day of the week.
Total travel to ITPL around an hour, To EC about an hour and 15 mins. All travel times assumes mass transport on dedicated lanes, otherwise forget it.
What other options could there be?
If there was a north south corridor train (new colored line) or the big 10 ran end to end on dedicated lanes. Then I take feeder to bellary road in 10 mins wait time of 2 mins at peak hour then 1 hour all the way to EC. Still same time.
If I went to hebbal station and then took commuter train to Whitefield or to Heelalige and took feeder both ends then it could be interesting. Even more interesting is if the commuter train comes up on existing lines, Anekal could become a countermagnet as the train to EC continues to Anekal.
Or If I used metro... wait the nearest metro station is in Yeswantpur... dang! I am stuck to my car till all those dedicated trams and trains are run all over the city. At least around 200 kms covering all parts of the city.
one hour..anyways!
Girinagar to Bagmane techpark takes lil more than an hour drive anyways..even if the traffic is normal..and using gully routes!
Bad traffic makes it upto 2 hours sometimes!
I am one of those eagerly waiting for the metro to come up..dream to hop on at the mysore rd station and get down at byp..
However plan to use the 2010 metro line from byp to mg road..hopefully they will run shuttles from byp to cv raman nagar end of next year when the mg rd - byp lines open...no time saving expected..stress free commute could be!
Smoking pipes
While we are in the business of smoking pipes - I guess I could describe my commute. I live in Malleshwaram and commute to Kengeri. I could walk 5 minutes to Malleshwaram station - pay 10 rupees - get off at Kengeri 20-30 minutes later. Walk five minutes to my office. It would be a relaxing, pollution free commute which could be implemented tomorrow. Instead my commute is a 45 minutes, at best, to 11/2 hours, at times, drive through the metro destructed parts of the city.
Ramesh
All tracks lead to...
It is apparent a high frequency commuter train on current tracks within the city could be a big boon. The advantage is that the city grew around those tracks.
Short term, because SWR doesnt want anything to do with managing a high frequency city service other than their own, we should negotiate to setup a neutral organization with representatives from IR & City train services (BMRC?) on the board which can setup signalling & manage both IR & City train services. If some of the IR trains can be terminated at KR Puram, Yeswantspur etc then within the city there will be bandwidth for higher frequency trains. Services to Tumkur & Whitefield/Kolar can be less frequent based on load.
Long term, adding extra tracks could be an option in which case we could use the IR land between the current tracks to lay over head standard guage tracks. Basically double the tracks overhead instead of at grade. This also gives the ability to deviate into areas adjoining the current tracks and join back where appropriate.
The administrators are just wasting tracks in the middle of the city.
Can we as citizens solve this issue?
1. We can file RTI to know status of transport development projects and publish the results in newspapers.
2. We can file a Public Interest Petition and follow it up by involving prominent citizens.
3. Create local committees, and monitor local roads, and file a weekly complaint with authorities. This will keep them on their toes.
Smoking pipes is important
In the middle of all the noise, nobody bothers to present what they, or rather we want. Not in terms of operational stuff like BBMP should be corruption free, people should be fined for being rash etc. A goal is different from operationalizing them. And to describe goals in transportation space in this PT starved city, smoking pipes is pretty important :)