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Think traffic!!! Think solution!!!

Can you point out ten important cause for the traffic congestion in the city? 1. Signal jumping, 2. Short distance signals, 3. Unorganized road signages, 4. Local repair works, 5. Due to officials passing, 6. U turns, 7. narrow roads, 8. Vehicle breakdowns on road & accidents 9. Religious issues, 10.commercial and other Buildings
blrsri's picture

10 more..

11.Lack of public transport like metro 

12.cows and other animals

13.slow push cart/bullock cart

14.lack of pedestrian crossings

15.lack of footpaths

16.unplanned roads(wide at some places and narrow at junctions)

17.BMTC bus stops

18.BMTC busses

19.Political parties meetings

10.No one bothered about traffic (complain but dont do much)

navshot's picture

1 more...

One more that, I believe, is far more important than previous 20... 1. Strict Enforcement If you've been to Mumbai you know what I mean. Someone commented that India will never improve. It can. Very simple - create fear in each and every road user such that he will never ever think of violating the rules. How? Create a dedicated team of honest police, maybe 8-10 in number. Each day, they would choose, randomly, a junction/road and COMPLETELY enforce all the rules. First time offenders would be fined nominally. Second time offenders heavily. Third time offenders' license would be canceled. In case of jaywalking/animals, they would be arrested. Ofcourse, this requires infrastructure to be upgraded. But lets start enforcing whatever is practical and see the results. This requires "will" of concerned authorities. Do they have it?
-- navshot
Photoyogi's picture

Some More

Taking your car to the local grocery to buy Kothmari soppu (corriander leaves) Parking that car at a junction as its the closest point to the shop Topping the list is the Lack of road sense / consideration for other users -- Praveen Sundaram AkA PhotoYogi

-- PhotoYogi

ar_t_kaushik's picture

Think traffic!!! think solution!!!

Again clearly mentioning it.. reasons for the cause of traffic.. I dont feel few points that you mentioned above are really affecting so.. Like.. 1.Cows and other animals: We cannot blame any animals for the traffic, and it cannot be a major issue for traffic. 2.Lack of pedestrian crossings& pedestrian footpath: pedestrian crossing is there in all signals,nowadays footpath is been main used by bikers and i dont feel this can be cause for traffic. 3.unplanned roads(wide at some places and narrow at junctions): This city has awarded many times for the planned city, so called garden city. The roads were planned according to the old city style, not for sure for current traffic needs. Irrespective of that, in many places fly overs are in action, but still we are not able to control traffic. 4. BMTC buses & stops: We cannot blame the public mode of transport, we can restrict the stoppings and we cannot rule out buses. Its the main mode of transport in any city. 5. No one bothered about traffic (complain but dont do much): Thats the reason we should take some steps to suggest in innovative ways. Not everyone not bothered, everyoe just waiting for someone to start. So out the 20, i feel the five cannot be a cause. Basically this points are not just to discuss, we should give solution for the problems. Lets stop saying roads not wide, already roads area crossed the standards for a city area.

Kaushik.T

Architect

ar_t_kaushik's picture

Think traffic!!! think solution!!!

Thats good to hear and nice to see too. But, The area of bangalore is around 725 sqkm.. Which is as small as of all cities of India. And too there are so many signals at very short distance. Example: From Townhall to majestic the distance is hardly 2kms.. we have 7 to 8 signals. We can propose some solutions by sorting out the major cause for traffic in the city. Everything is possible only if we think we can.

Kaushik.T

Architect

santsub's picture

Traffic law enforcement

I think its hightime we impose law on every citizen. Can we start something as a pilot in Bangalore - where every drivers license is connected to the RTO to track and to the Insurance companies. Impose fines on any misconduct or traffic violation and that inturn linked to a point system which will eventually result in loosing their permit to drive or ride a two wheeler if they are repeated offenders.

Indirectly it will also increase their insurance eachtime they will violate and get tickets.

Personally I feel we have to educate our drivers and riders with traffic rules which I am sure no body remembers or in manycases even are aware of. May be a strict retest for license will do some magic.

This will follow infrastructure upgrades and lane systems etc.
roshanrk's picture

Better traffice Sense

I guess we can improve the traffic situation to a certain extent if all of us follow the traffic laws. 1. It's like nobody here has heard of the lane system. 2. Footpath is not to ride 2 wheelers on. 3. Linking insurance premium to how good a driver you are. Higher premiums for people with bad record And most importantly as has been mentioned before, better enforcement. Fine drivers for not following lane discipline, for not carrying proper documents etc. I think once people realize there is a heavy financial disincentive to breaking rules it should hopefully get better. And yeah, hope metro becomes a reality fater.
ar_t_kaushik's picture

New revolution!! New bengaluru!!

We can improve the traffic in many ways, lets find the reasons for it to resolve. Not all traffic problems are due to traffic rules.. Ofcourse many people dont follow signals,thats happening since no control at signals even though TP present at those spots. We can come up with ideas to create awareness and strict inforcement for violators. As our friend told, we have bring some pilotic actions. We have better solution, we need to get it in right time... Lets join hands to be a part of new revolution.. GREEN BENGALURU!!!!

Kaushik.T

Architect

blrsri's picture

Blr's Katrina

2005 saw katrina hit the US coast and as we all know the famous levees breached innundating the whole of New Orleans.

What followed after that in the city was something that US could never comprehend..the relief machinery failed and so did the complete law and order! They are still doing studies on it to understand what happened..

So Bangalore's katrina, as in the rapid growth, hit us around 10 years ago. This along with some innefficient governaments and authorities has led to where we are now!

Gone are the days when a 12 year old could cycle freely through vidhana souda(no gates and empty roads) and wonder what happens inside, after seeing C.M Hegde get into a car and drive away!

US and New Orleans recovered..now with an Indian at the helm..Bobby Jindal..but bangalore still waits!

tsubba's picture

reasons

i think, apart from mind numbing volume of private vehicles, the biggest reason is the lack of actual engineers to address the traffic congestion problem. there has to be a cadre of engineers who trained, dedicated and empowered to address traffic congestion. only if they say, a road should be widened. only if they say should an underpass be constructed. and so on.. even now there are people signing of on these decisions, but they are not traffic engineers. the core of this cadre should be local and permanent to bangalore. people who understand the constraints of bangalore. congestion will never be eliminated and sure our roads are over subscribed. but there is no point in increasing the road capacity, when we are not even sure that existing roads have any level of optimization. you say 10-lights within 2 kms are problematic. they need notbe if they are synchronized and if the purpose of the road is clear. if a road has a footpath, and has 10s of lights, it is a tell tale sign of a local access road and it should NOT be used as an artery. the signs are there, only we are overlooking them. you say bus stop locations are not problematic. but where a stop is located is very critical. i will post some info on this later. meanwhile please go through some of the discussions
Vasanth's picture

Cars Especially Big Cars Which is Mainly Missing in the posts

Since more and more people use cars, cars itself is not mentioned. Increased traffic is also due to increased number of cars. 6 2 wheelers can occupy the space of a car and probably 9 in the space of a MUV/SUV. Also the space occupied is too much. I have seen many car drivers very jealous about 2 wheelers. Many scenarios such as if a car is moving slowly in the front and the back car also cannot overtake, the back car will not come in line with the front car. Half of the back car will be on the right side of the front car blocking other 2 wheelers behind also not to pass through blocking the entire thread. Big cars and SUVs during peak hours in congested roads such as Bannerghatta Road and Hosur Road is a major curse to the roads. Our Government officials are also using big cars. Most of the Government cars are Toyota Corolla. Such a huge investment by Government as well as blocking of roads. Something needs to be done about the big cars despite of the protests by Car companies. These cars are very slow in turnings and U turns blocking the entire traffic. To see the scenario, please come to Bannerghatta Road opposite JalaBhavan, almost all the cars especially big cars will be struggling to take U turns blocking the entire road. Many techies bring Innova, Safari, Scorpio to office. Cars are needed for family usage, but, small cars can serve the purpose with good fuel efficiency as well as less space occupancy. What is the use of buying a big car like Corolla/Elentra/Civic or SUV like Scorpio/Innova/Safari to travel in traffic at not more than 50 kph. It is just the 'prestige showoff'. Big cars are sold saying it is more safer than small cars, but, in Bangalore city limits an impact can happen only at 40-50 kph. For intercity travel, it is always safer to travel by Buses or Trains. Most of the people especially techies who are supposed to be most sensible people in society are giving up life on highways along with their family and putting an end to their entire family just to have a fun drive. Recent example is the death of an entire family of a techie from Infosys on his Swift car on the NH4. In India traffic is totally unpredictable and especially on the highways it tempts to go at higher speeds which will become fatal.
Vasanth's picture

Too many Traffic signals are mainly due to road intersections

We feel when we are travelling on JC Road that there should be no signal lights, but without signals it is not at all possible to sort out the traffic problems. If 1 signal is not working for 1 hour, traffic will become a real mess. Long waiting signals are the major problems which leads to frustation among drivers. Traffic should be left in small chunks in more frequency. In Majestic area it is far better since the signal waitings are in the range of 90 secs. It is very problematic in Ring Road where all the signals are 180 secs. Once the signal is left, people will rush madly so that they do not miss green signal and at the road they will speed up madly. This is where Bangalore Traffic Police have to work on. There is no uniformity in signal wait times. It is decided by local police personnel who decide that very vaguely without thinking its impact. Synchronized signal plus minimum waiting time can reduce the frustation.
KoKloxKlon's picture

How to improve traffic flow on Ring Road ?

I have 3 suggestions

  1. Govt should invest ( or let private parties invest) in tow-aways on the ring road
  2. The ring road has Side lanes (or bylanes) in almost all the locations. ALL BMTC and private Buses should be made to halt on the side roads. For this, small low cost changes have to be made after the junctions on the ring road so that the BMTC busses can get into the side lanes and then merge back into the ring road
  3. In heavy junctions ( or all the junctions) on the ring road, if the Govt does not have budget for building flyovers ( or underpasses) in the near future, The junction can be closed. Instead dedicated non-junction broad U-turns should be created on either side of the junction on the ring road ( In  my observation there is enough space for this). The vehicles on the ring road that need to take a right turn from the ring road ( into the perpendicular road) will now go straight, take a U turn, come back and take a left turn. The vehicles on the perpendicular road to the ring road that need to go straight in the junction will now take a left turn, then take a U turn and then a left turn again. THIS WAY WE WILL AVOID SIGNALS with minimal cost. This has worked succesfully in some areas in Delhi Gurgaon road.

 Additional points for suggestion 1.

  • Every truck, bus or car that breaks down on the ring road show be towed-away with a charge of Rs 500. After the first few fines most of the vehicle owners will ensure better maintenance
  • Every vehicle that is parked (Or halted on the ring road) on the Ring road should be towed away or forced to vacate with a fine of Rs 200

Pls provide your feedback on these suggestionsi. Also suggest know how to take this to next level of feasibility analyisis and piloting

blrsri's picture

beijing inspired?

http://en.wikipedia.org/w...

Have been reading about ring roads and the one that comes to mind is the series of ring roads of Beijing..the roads there are junction free..

I think thats the way to go..make the entire ring road junction free..as can be seen our ring road has almost a lane(drain/trees) seperating the service road  with the main road..

All that is needed is to employ good tranport engineers to use this land and the instant underpasses. RK Mishra studied transportation from Japan? It would be a good impact if he can take this project up to make Ring road signal free!

Trucks should anyway be banned from the ring road..wheres the peripheral road? 

Tow trucks? why not eploy private parties? All the govt needs to do is to outsource the job..this would also avoid excessive bribing as the private guy would charge them on actuals! Towing is needed on all roads..tigers do, but always as a means of bribes!

 

Current ring road is a mess during peak hours..where all violations happen and makes travelling impossibly slow! Junctions like the one near Intel are pathetic! Signal free is the way to go..there are means but all that is needed is the will!
sound horn NOT ok's picture

reasons

i have to agree to tarlesubba saying " there is no point in increasing the road capacity". Clearly research has shown that increase in the road capacity will only bring more traffic and taking it back to square one in no time. What bangalore badly needs is a mass transit system along the main corridors like hosur road, bannerghata road, mysore road, whitefield road, bellary road, tumkur road and ring road. Though 'metro' will take another 3-4 years to be fully operational and effective, BRTS(bus rapid transit system) can be very effective along these routes, considering the road width. one lane can be dedicated to high capacity and high frequency,comfortable, buses and cabs. this move will definitely see a shift from private vehicles to public transport. Also lanes can be dedicated to high occupancy vehicles. Say, a car only with 4 people will be allowed to use a dedicated lane.Though implementing such a process will be difficult given the attitude of the road users and the enforcing officers. And ofcourse all this would only work if people are 'sensitised', becoming aware of the problems and be a part of the solution.
ar_t_kaushik's picture

Is it some many signals required????

As you said.. There are so many intersections and cross roads.. Ofcourse we cannot avoid those. But there are alternative ways to avoid those signals to have a clear traffic free road in many cases. FOR EXAMPLE: If you take the signal near corporation when you drive from mysore road, which takes you through SProad, In that particular place, we have good scope of having a underground subway for vehicles leading to Lalbagh from mysore road, else we can have UGsubway for vehicles moving from townhall and from other end of corporation. These can substanially reduce mass traffic at key junctions.

Kaushik.T

Architect

ar_t_kaushik's picture

LETS NOT BLAME TECHNOLGY!!!!!

Every one has its own dreams.. Some dream to built a big house, so he/she plans and land is getting occupied. WE CANNOT SAY YOU CANNOT BUILD HOUSE IN THIS CITY. Some dream to buy car(any size), so he/she goes for a company to buy a car of his level. OFCOURSE WE CANNOT SAY YOU CANNOT BUY IN THIS CITY. Same way every bike drivers wil have a dream to drive a car which wil be running in their minds. If you mean cars are main traffic creators, then what about the TATA NANO, what its gonna create. And average bike costs in the city ranges from Rs55,000 to even Rs.1,20,000.which is almost equal to a NANO If you replace a bike with a NANO(cheapest small car), it occupies four bikers area. Again if you replace six bikes with six NANO's. It occupies twice the area of one SUV/any midsize car. CARS ARE OUR PART OF TECHNOLOGY, WE CREATE THE SMALLEST AND ALSO THE LONGEST. LETS NOT BLAME TECHNOLOGY!!! Lets think solution!!

Kaushik.T

Architect

ar_t_kaushik's picture

Kaushik.T Architect

Kaushik.T Architect

Kaushik.T

Architect

tsubba's picture

michigan left

these types of turns are operational in other places too. how does the u-turn impact the traffic on the ORR main throughfare? Also given the volumes on orr will this work? http://en.wikipedia.org/w...
ar_t_kaushik's picture

U turn

When we are moving in a fast lane or in signals, these U turns located at signals/ bit before the signals creates the congestion in that place and makes the vehicles which is behind to turn away from that vehicle, again that brings collision among the vehicles.

Kaushik.T

Architect

blrsri's picture

U-turn flyover

This is an example of typical u turn in '3rd world' countries..thats what was written in Wiki sometime ago..

This is a viable option for bangalore too..to make all roads signal free..

Now with the magic underpasses, that looks like a better option to create signal less rides on ring road and other roads!

 

Vasanth's picture

Let us use Technology in Right Way

Many countries especially US countries which are Car Bound are facing lot of problems even with highly systematic traffic management. California state is the best example. Here there are 8 layer flyovers, 5 lane roads, no U turns. Traffic situation is ideal like whatever that has been said in this thread. Despite of that, because of sheer number of cars, traffic is jam packed. Now, in western US states such as California and Virginia, after having fed up with Car mess, they are stressing on public transport. Please visit www.soundtransit.org for more details on Virginia's initiative on public transport.

In these countries, drivers are disciplined, follow lane discipline etc. almost ideal, but still traffic is uncontrollable with all the infrastructure in place mainly because of sheer number of cars. Also the pollution resulting from so many cars is huge.

It is the attitude of the people in Bangalore to have all the luxury of big cars and SUVs and ultimately blaming the infrastructure which is resulting in traffic snarls. Also, we are not good and disciplined drivers. Everyone thinks himself as an hero and expert driver and do not follow any traffic discipline. This has resulted in Hosur, Bannerghatta, Tumkur road jams which is the prime example. Public transport is the main answer for this and hence allover this praja site most of our members are stressing on public transport. Why we are all stressing on Airport Rail and Buses on Dedicated Lines although there is three laned road, it is mainly to overcome the congestion. Almost all of the members have cars and love to drive cars, but, for the public cause we are all ready to sacrifice that once we get effective MRTS. Everyone has to sacrifice to some extent.

People are that's why stressing to introduce Tolls in main traffic hit roads like Hosur Road , Bannerghatta Road etc to reduce the number of vehicles. In Western countries, usage of cars in Metros like NewYork, Washington DC is not supported by Government by putting heavy tolls while entering the city and huge amount of parking fees such as 40$/hour in the city. Outside Metros, infrastructure is developed to use cars. People come to the nearest railway station to the Metro in cars, park their cars and take trains from there. Newark in New Jersey near to the NewYork is the best example where people from New Jersey working in New York park their cars and take Train to New York to goto work.

Heading of this thread itself should have been - Don't think traffic - Think of Public Transport Cool. This is what Bangalore is lacking today and development of efficient Public Transport instead of cutting trees, widening roads etc.

Benefits are many:

1. No private vehicle maintenance costs
2. No need of driver/driving skills
3. No insurance which is hefty for cars
4. Saving of car parking space at home - You can convert your 2 bedroom house to 3-4 bedroom house.
5. No headache of scratches and dents
6. No fights on the road - no more visit to police stations to claim the vehicle towed from no-parking area.

Bangalore needs effective Public Transport with excellent pavements to walk on and skywalks to cross the roads which is not at all concentrated by the Government.

Houses Do Not Move and Cars Move - There lies the difference between house and a car. I have a dream to drive Volvo Bus - Shall I use it alone for office commute? Dreams should go in the right direction and to reduce congestion!!

navshot's picture

Economics

Vasanth,

Its not that simple. I think even least (edited from most) serious and professional policy makers understand that public transport is the best mode. As with everything, even with this there is an economic side of the story. If you take Metro example, according to some studies, for Metrorail to be viable, the FAR (floor area ratio) has to be upwards of 5:1 (eg: 100,000 sq.ft. of floor area built over 20,000 sq.ft., including spaces left for roads, parks, etc). Anything less than 1.5:1 (30,000 sq.ft floor area built over 20,000 sq.ft. land), only automobiles are viable. Please read the following:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w...

I don't think Bangalore has any area which is more than 1.5:1 (at the most 2:1). The studies also say that world over, cities struggle to provide a good transport solution for FAR between 1.5:1 to around 4:1.

This is probably one of the reasons why Bangalore Metro is working with Govt. to encourage high raised buildings along the metro lines.

-- navshot
blrsri's picture

FAR includes road?

The problem with blr is about non exixtant roads..if you have travelled towards ITPL you will see two very big constructions coming up..one is the Brigade Metropolis and the other is the Prestige Shantiniketan..the number of houses and commercial space being put together is mindbogling and the 2 lane road in front of it will in no way be sufficient to take the load..this along with many other firms coming up there make the road totally inadequate..it takes one hour to travel a distance of less than 8 kms during peak hours..

I was wondering the CBD concept to get redifined in the Blr context where we have MBD or multiple business districts within a city!

So more than the FAR, the public transport should concetrate on connecting all these business districts..this will avoid all the other means of transprt like taxis of call centers..

Feel that the first phase of metro in BLR will almost serve no purpose as the rideship could be very low as it starts and could threaten the whole project itself as they might realize that its a white elephant..instead extending the metro from KR puram to ITPL (8 Km) could really make sense and avoid the road congestion!



ar_t_kaushik's picture

Sounds very funny

Ofcourse houses doesnt move but it occupies a massive space on the earth and its meant for it. Sameway, cars moves and serves the purpose. Bangalore cannot have only public transport,are we have enough infrastructure to have that?? Will you travel un BMTC with full rush?? will you think for alternative or go ahead with it. Think of all age people who move from one place to other.. If you dream to drive so and so vehicle, ofcourse you can, You wil be paying extra money to drive so in the city. Dreams drives human life.. Congestion is not always because of the vehicle wat we use day to day.. thats not the reason for traffic. Still... you have to think traffic!! again.. Traffic is mainly due to time, location, surrounding and type of zone. If you can sort with the following points, we can get idea about why traffic really happens.

Kaushik.T

Architect

navshot's picture

blrsri, This again is

blrsri,

This again is looking at it from one angle. From economics point of view, I don't think its viable to have metro from KR Puram to ITPL.

Also, I understand, Bangalore is one of the most haphazardly grown cities. Even today it continues. You should read Bangalore's CDP for 2005 created way back in 1995. Reading the CDP, you'd imagine a world class city by 2005. But you know what state we are in. 

Of course, apart from all these, govt. can still go in for a comprehensive metro network running at loss, purely considering the fact that it helps public - just like how it is in the case of most of the metros world over. Only difference - I think we are not yet a rich country that can afford to have a hugely loss making metro network in all major cities across the country.

-- navshot
tsubba's picture

stasis

energy and space are the more important parameters. viability of public transport is a distracting parameter. while viability of pubtrans is an important parameter, the critical parameter is the viability of the city itself. getting distracted by viability of pubtrans, we jeopardize the viability of the city itself. at the same time viability by itself does not amount to anything. for example BMTC, it is viable, and serving some purpose, but clearly it is not sufficient and clearly not scalable to the level of problems and constrainst we have. without any sort of pubtrans, even if it is loss making, all these buildings with greek names will become like the structures that they are named after. then what? can anybody imagine NYC without its metro? despite all this talk about viability of pubtrans i dont think there is any city in the world that has retrenched its major public transit modes. (small scale modes like electric buses and proprietary and untested systems like mono perhaps but not metro type ROW based systems) agreed that there are multiple theoretical and practical parameters in this problem. but trying to work out a solution that satisfies all of these at the same time, before doing anything on the ground will surely lead to the death of the city. we have what we have. the city has developed the way it has. that is given, we can perhaps can do something about what will be in future, but cant do much about what is. getting stuck with theoretical parameters like 'FAR should be so much for pub trans to be viable', 'unlike other cities, bangalore no CBD so metro will not work' is a sure shot way of setting up for stasis. bcoz there is no metro no theoretical structure for the city has evolved. bcoz there is no theoretical structure there can be no public transit. show is over, everybody clap your hands and go home. instead of taking the tougher road of fixing the theoretical structure before pubtrans. how about fix the pubtrans and then let the city evolve around the pubtrans? this way, instead of solving for all the parameters at the same time, we fix one thing and then adjust the rest of parameters around it. like we have discussed previously, ideal alignment would connect all sorts of places within bangalore. but the current route will be at the core of any ideal alignment anybody can come up with, simply bcoz these are the central links. peenya to bsk, mysrd to krpuram is going to be on any ideal metro map of blr. suspend thought experiments and get it done then move on to the next thing. and fast.
navshot's picture

Ts, I understand what you're

Ts,

I understand what you're getting at. All I had in my mind when talking economics is - are we convinced that all the low hanging fruits have been plucked? I'm personally not convinced. For example, by spending 50 crores, if we can solve a problem (say with objective of X km/hr average speed of commute), we should do that first before spending 5000 crores PLUS running cost of a crore every year and still get only X km/hr average speed of commute time. Ofcourse, in the long run the latter option may be more scalable and has to be done. But I think we should first attack what helps now and easily and cheaply too.

-- navshot
tsubba's picture

fruits

hi navshot. just trying to clear my own head about this. it helps that you raise questions. thanks. standalone 50 crore low hangers are all in the allied areas, automation, planning cell etc etc... not directly related to transport. in transport there are only long lists of 50 crore a pop chains. for example for CRS to work, need 18 ROB/RUB at atleast 20 cr each. thats 360 crores. check the summary table below. even if you ignore the 5000 crore for new roads, other road related improvements come to more than 4000 crores. details in this document. as you said, like the CDP, day by day it is becoming apparent that this is just another plan. nevertheless since it gives you an idea as to what needs to be done at the bare minimum. it takes some time to appreciate that fixing roads of the city meaningfully takes the same amount of resources as getting the metro done. (to be fruity, need to pluck a whole lots of low hanging fruits before we can make sihikarni) it is not one or the other, both of them need to be fixed before anything meaningful can happen. but imo the it is critical to take up metro now seriously bcoz the will to execute is diluted by all sorts of distractions. (metro/mono, is it viable, is the city suited for metro? and so on not to mention people stalling the project, only to make frivilous arguments in the courts.) very easy to get distracted. but if we think conditions are not ideal for metro now, it will be worse, by the time we wait for the yard to be saars-ofied and all low hanging fruits to be plucked. the more we wait the more the problems get worse. karthick talks about one of the problems - who are you going to ask not use private vehicles? the city keeps growing. some thing like a metro is needed to provide structure.
blrsri's picture

we have DMU's already...

I am not sure of your daily travel needs but many of bangaloreans spend pathetic non productive frustrating hours on the road travelling from places like Peenya to EC or Nayandahalli to ITPL..its a minimum 4 hour commute everyday..and now the docs say its not good to read in a running bus as the constant shaking strains eyes..or they suggest to wear a pollution mask inside a bus waiting at a hopeless jam!

 

The road traffic is being compunded by the on road DMU's..Have you ever had a chance to get stuck behind or in the middle of train of busses while heading to any of the PSU's/ITPL/Wipro's/Infosys's..its like a 2 wheeler rider will have a run for his life everyday..

 

BMTC is raking in profits not because of public/janata transport..but more because of these trains..starting from almost every big company in bangalore! This also includes..the other multiple trains of verious sizes from the Janani's and SRS's(earlier only knew of SRS doing trips to Bombay thru Dvg)..

 

 About money, there is no dearth of it..where is all the petrol tax going? We pay the most for petrol in India. Earlier we were collecting for metro separately but now its collectively collected as sales tax..what is this money for? to waive farmer loans?

 

Blr has been called pensioners paradise..its now hell..where old couples staying at BSK have to plan like a US trip to visit their children in say hebbal/banaswadi..also here they have to go thro all the painful 'watch the traffic' issues..

 

Its high time we get the congestion tax on bigger vehicles and get the metro in place..

navshot's picture

No doubts

Ts,

Absolutely no doubts in my mind whether Metro should be done now or later. It has to be done now. Period. I was referring to metro routes say, between KR Puram and ITPL or say between Sarjapur road and EC and such routes.

Also, when I said 50 crores, I was refering to 50 magic box underpasses, which directly solves today's traffic problems.

-- navshot
Vasanth's picture

What we thought through our discussions

Throughout our discussions in praja site, it was basically felt that MRTS with dedicated right of the way is the necessity. This augmented with good Bus Service and Shared Environmentally Friendly Feeder Vehicles such as Reva like cars acting as a feeder can reduce the emissions and traffic. Transport hub needs to be developed with multistoried parking. Also Pedestrain walking path and bicycle path needs to be provided encouraging walking and bicycling.

 

Cars are 1 way necessary to transport aged / small children. But, its usage should be reduced. Small cars should be considered in such cases. Used cars are available from 10,000 itself, everyone can afford it. It is not the question of arrordability as said in the thread. It is the question of practicality. If someone is thinking that he is a bigshot and he should only travel in luxury big cars and SUVs, he is the culprit. If he is doing so with car pooling with others, then he is sensible. The way in which people are thinking is the main problem for Bangalore.

 

As TS posted with the example of Bangkok along with pictures, widening of the roads will attract more number of cars, reduce the length of the jam and increase the width. Moreover, in our discussions, we are very poor disciplined in driving which causes all the chokes and jams. This all necessiates an effective Public Transit for Bangalore. Currently BMTC buses are overcrowded. We are urging the government to improve the service by providing hi-tech buses to cater the needs of hifi people. Poor and lower middle class people use it extensively, it is the upper class society - mainly the IT crowd of Bangalore who needs to be attracted towards Public Transport.  Murali has posted a lot on better Bussing for Bangalore, Naveen lot on increasing the Metro network and cvikash on feeder service for the same.

 

We the improvement of roads and improvement of traffic as well, but in the long run, public transit is the only solution.

roshanrk's picture

10 times higher fines and better enforcement for a start?

I have read through the comments and all are very interesting. IMO, I think we should start by increasing the fines for traffic fines by maybe 10 times for all offenses across the board. At least for offenses committed in Bangalore city. Follow this up with strict enforcement of all rules without fear or prejudice. I think people know they aren't hauled up for not following rules or traffic signs. And even if they do, the economic consequence is minimal for most people. If we realize that flouting laws means heavy fines and that they will be fined by the cops when caught, we will start following the laws better. Pay up or face cancellation of your license! Follow this up with better road markings and improving the infrastructure as is being done by B-TRAC now. I'm sure this will help ease some traffic situation. At least this will force people to realize that there are lanes which needs to be followed. They'll realize that the markings are not painted to beautify the roads!! Another thing we could look at is linking the insurance premium with your driving record. Higher premiums for bad drivers. All that I'm saying is to hit us where it hurts the most and making sure it hurts when we flout laws. This should be a start. Throw the book at offenders. Make sure everyone is aware of the laws. Currently this awareness is sorely lacking amongst all of us.
Bheema.Upadhyaya's picture

Check this..

On lighter note ! I like the photographers instant idea to capture the moment to convey the message: learn descipline from me. Then all would be well

" My mantra to public bodies=> Enable->Educate->Enforce. Where does  DDC  fit?"

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