Hi all,

This is my first post to Praja. I live in Kammanahalli and work in an organisation in ITPL. I use the BMTC ITPL buses (Pushpaks) for my daily commute to office. So using the bus on Bus Day, i.e. 4th Feb last week was nothing new to me. :-)

The Bus Day was promoted with great fanfare by the Praja members and also the media in Bangalore. I also tried to convince a couple of my colleagues to switch to travelling by bus on Bus Day. On Bus Day, I found that one of my colleagues (whom I had tried to convince) had come by his car. The reason he gave me was that since he lived in Basava Nagar (which is about 2 kms from Airport Road), the auto drivers would charge him minimum Rs. 20 and he had also missed the BMTC bus (which apparently has a poor frequency) from Basava Nagar till Airport Road. The lack of last-mile connectivity thwarted his efforts to use the bus. This was actually one of the points raised in an earlier post that there should be a regular shuttle service from areas like Vignan Nagar, Basava Nagar, Thippasandra till the Old Airport Road. People can use these shuttles till Airport Road and then get into Big10-1 or Volvo's like 335P, 355E, 335T which have a very good frequency. The combination of shuttle for 2-3 kms (fares would be Rs.4 - 5) and Big 10 (Rs. 10 for a distance of 10-11 kms.) would actually work out to be quite cost-effective for most people.

Another colleague who lived in BEML Layout boarded a Whitefield-Marathahalli shuttle bus that day and paid Rs.10 for his ride till ITPL. He got a drop from his wife till the main road (AECS Layout/Brookefields). He found his ride in the bus to be quite comfortable and may actually continue with it.

Regarding Clive who also lives in Kammanahalli but works in GR Tech Park, Whitefield, well he could catch the 500DB Volvo that plies from Hebbal to Hope Farm as Prabha pointed out. But this bus has a very poor frequency, something like 1 bus in every 35-40 minutes. Also personally, I have an issue with the lengthy route that this bus takes. The route is Hebbal --> Kalyan Nagar --> K.R. Puram --> Marathahalli --> AECS Layout --> ITPL --> Hope Farm. Whereas the BMTC ITPL buses that I take generally go past K.R. Puram --> Mahadevpura (via Whitefield Road) --> Hoody --> ITPL. The extended route for 500DB takes about 80 minutes from Kalyan Nagar till ITPL whereas the BMTC ITPL bus takes about 40 minutes. Almost double the time is not acceptable even for a comfortable A/C ride. People generally are in a hurry to reach office in time and don't have the time for a nice joy ride. :-)  There is actually a direct bus route 601 from Kalyan Nagar bus stand till ITPL (and Hope Farm), but it is too crowded and less frequent for it to be a viable solution for most techies residing in the Hebbal/Kalyan Nagar area.

I personally feel that last-mile connectivity issues are actually easier to resolve. For example, even for the Kammanahalli area, BMTC could have a shuttle service from R.S. Palya (start of Kammanahalli Main Road) till Kamanahalli Ring Road Jn. There would be plenty of takers for this service. Resolving last-mile connectivity would actually be the low-hanging fruit that BMTC should first tackle.

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I had to drop the buses today and take Car, because of the fact that I do not have Direct buses from Kadubessnahalli to ITPL early in the morning 6.30 AM. I waited for 15 mins and no buses. Then had take the car.

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Dear BMTC team

Great job, I enjoyed the Volvo drive.  Please make the Bus day weekly instead of Monthly, I will ensure that will not take my car if I travel alone.

Regards

Murugan

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The bus ride was nice...but I will not be trading in a faster and less cumbersome car ride for a bus ride in the future unless I get better connectivity....

I stay in Kamanahalli and had to have someone drop me off to the ring road at Kalyan Nagar (not so convenient but Ok)...waited over 25 minutes for a Volvo and finally came across one that was bursting at its sides, I let it pass...another 20 minutes and another one came along....full but I mananged to get a seat near KR Puram....this again was not a direct bus to ITPL/Hope Farm (GR Tech Park is my work place) and so I had to change at Marathalli...the Connecting bus stops at Marathalli are a KM apart so I had to brave the sun for a 10 minute walk to the stop to catch a bus that would take me in the ITPL direction...many buses came along but most terminate at ITPL which is a good 20 minute walk to GR Tech Park which is about 1.5 KM away....finally managed to get a Volvo going towards Hope Farm and took it reached in 30 min....all and all about 1 hr 45 minutes to reach and alot of waiting and walking....Anyway this is a lesson and hopefully things will get better.

like I said comfortable while in the bus - but the connections and last mile were not to easy on me....wish I could take the bus more often cause i enjoyed reading while journeying to work...if only it was one bus right through....

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hi

there is a volvo bus 500db from hebbal to ITPL.. in that u dont have switch buses in Marathahalli.. the issue is frequency is not much check with the depot.. unfortuantely BMTC website is not updated/ and not user friendly..

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last mile connectivity is poor..

work in CV raman ngr..got down from 333p at HAL and had to take a rick..

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i regularly take the bus to work .here are my few suggestions as the BMTC site suggestion/complaint page is down

During peak hours they should either stop the pushpak services(no conductors). in this buses drivers have to double up as conductors so these drivers stop for more time in every bus stops..so this creates a jam in all the bus stops.and other buses like volvo/big 10 buses  do not stop in the busstop becos' pushpak is already occupying the busstop and refusing to move.. either these pushpak drivers shd move ahead and stop away from bus stop for issuing tickets..or duing peak time the buses also needs to have conductors..

it is a nice move that BMTC has raised the frequency of volvos 335e from majestic to ITPL.My request is when they are travelling in the oposite direction(itpl to majestic)..as these buses run bumper to bumper to catch passengers..needless to say they are not fully occupied/utilized.

.some of these 335 E buses (on their return route)can be redirected to some other routes..other it parks like Hebbal, wipro corp office , domlur inner ring road routes and Bagmane tech park..during peak times..becos' 411L&500 db  frequency is one in 30/45 mins ..there is no connectivity to bagmane park and wipro office ..this way BMTC can improve their bus utilization and also encourage more people to take buses to work..

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Today, I took 500A which starts from Banashankari and runs to Hebbal. First trip it starts in front of Kamakya Theatre. Frequency of this bus is less, but I get direct connectivity to Doddenakundi on ORR.

Daily it starts around 8AM, 15 mins here and there. Sometimes he used to leave early.

Today bus depot manager came and asked where we work and do we use the bus daily and we said yes. He asked what timeyou need. We said 8 sharp. He gave us his email id and bus driver's cell number also.

Depot manager wanted to take feedback, may be asked to do so. But, was not so friendly.

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 My bus commute from AECS layout to Outer Ring Road (Devarabeesanahalli) was comfortable as usual.  The pain points, as usual, were in crossing the road, finding a comfortable path to walk along the road  and avoiding being hit by enthusiastic motorists.  When it rains, the walk becomes and even bigger nightmare for me.

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Left home at 8:20 am, had a bus waiting to take me to shivajinagar...From there i boarded 331A, got down at marathahalli bridge.  The traffic police were using loud speakers to discipline people and buses.  Traffic at marathahalli was pleasantly organized, thanks to the traffic cops.   From there i used Whitefield Sarige-2 to Varthur kodi.  Everything seemed to be in place. 

Few sour points,  from my collegues who stary near in and around BEML.   There is no  buses for people in Thippasandra, vignanagar, basvanagarar etc to reach Airport road.  So a few did walk, and many were demotivated by the need to walk nearly 2-3 kms to airport road to take the bus.   If BMTC can provide regular feeder service to these areas, people will be ready to switch to BMTC. 

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My travel was from ORR/Sarjapur to Global Village, MindTree campus (on Mysore Road, next to RVCE and BGS)

Time taken: Going was about 2.5 hours Coming back home was about 1.5hrs.

From ORR to SilkBoard was the easiest, standing room Volvo. Waited for almost an hour for 375A, which would take me to BGS. When it finally came at around 10am (the actual arrival time, according to the conductor was 9:30am, it was near empty. The ride to the office was good and the campus provided free shuttles from BGS and RVCE every 15 minutes for today.

Coming back to BSK was a breeze and then caught a Depo25 bus to Agara and then caught a regular bus to ORR.

Total amount spent was about 50 compared to about 250  when a car is taken out.

Things liked: I loved going to office in non-office bus, except for the wait part at Silkboard. Very easy on the pocket and very easy on the stress levels. Walk to and from ORR was good..

Things hated: No time table when the buses will hit a particular spot.. Had to waste a lot of time near Silkboard, BMTC website is useless, their helpline information is useless. I called them for the timing of 375A and they said the last bus is at around 6ish.. The last bus is actually at 9ish.. They will not be able to tell you how to reach your office fast.. Am not sure how I will be able to figure that out..

With the schedule I keep and the amount of self research I have to do to get an optimum route, this is going to be a hobby rather than a serious effort from my part.. (sadly, ofcourse..)

-Pavan

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 @Srinidhi- better you get off at Domlur and then walk a bit to take 201R to CV Raman Nagar.  If you get off at HAL Main Gate you are stuck badly.  Suranjandas Road is a key road that does not get covered properly.  

@GNT - You should have simply continued on 500P or whichever goes to Vijayanagar and then boarded one of the Big10 buses to RVCE.  Instead of waiting for a particular route it is better to keep progressing in the general direction of your destination.  More expensive but beats waiting 1hr at Silkboard in the sun and rain.

Goes to show that BMTC needs to have a proper route planner as part of its website.

Srivathsa

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Not that I was expecting any changes, but I haven't done the Bus commute for a month now. So tried again today, and same set of problems.

• Left home at 8.40am
• Caught a black board till Kundalahalli cross. Enjoyed hanging at the door, what fun. Could have waited for the new whitefield Local Shuttle (WFS-1) or Big-10, but wanted the thrill of a footboard ride today :)
• Waited at K'halli for a Vajra or a Big10. 335E showed up in about 5 minutes.
• K'halli to HAL bus stand no problem, 9.15 am arrival.

And then the fun began. Autos were in short supply today, perhaps because of the Bus Day. So, I teamed up with someone to share an auto till Bagmane. But then, two autos refused saying they wont accept fare sharing business!! Well, too bad my random co-traveller didn't look like a family member. Eventually, I found one who was reasonable - no meter, and 50 Rs only. I showed him the surprise - my co-traveller - after the deal was struck, but he didn't mind it :)

Arrival, Bagmane at 9.45 am. 1 hour 5 minutes door to door. Takes 35-40 minutes by car. Don't mind the extra 20 minutes, but can't wait and haggle at HAL bus stand every morning. This is it, the only problem.

Just need a shuttle to ferry us from HAL airport stand to Bagmane, and I can bet at least 100-150 people will celebrate Bus Day everyday. Hopefuly, we will have one for the next Bus Day!

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Good job! Both praja and also BMTC:) Job well executed. But very much upset with the people who didn't push themselves to get into action. I wanted this to be more than just a "Good initiative" since its time that everybody understand the panic level w.r.t Traffic , environment and also one's own health is concerned. Probably I expected much more than what it could be.  Nevertheless, though not a significant difference its worth an effort to conduct such an event. I just hope BMTC got some valuable information to improve itself and for praja, it got that  motivation to keep doing what it has kept doing, "CREATING AWARENESS".

@BMTC one suggestion is to put more buses or increase the frequency of buses from Malleswaram - Vijaynagar - Global village Tech park(or RV engg college). There are lot of travellers (students and IT professionals) towards this area which will avoid us taking two or three connecting buses. 

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[Note: Suggestions converted into a new topic, see here: http://praja.in/en/blog/vasanth/2010/02/05/shuttle-suggestions-based-our-experiences ]

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Unfortunately, I could not do much other than riding the bus yesterday.   My initial initiative to provide last mile connectivity to people in Jayanagar/J.P.Nagar area did not materialize due to some legal issue.   I found out that it is illegal in Bangalore to provide 'shared auto rickshaw service' (I was not even charging for this).  I don't understand why but, I want to do further research (praja members can help) to find out why and how to get around this problem. It is ridiculous to pay 30 rupees (to and from)home to bus stop and then pay just 10 rupees on bus for a 10 kms bus ride.  With this kind of stupid rules, they will never get people out of their vehicles to use public transport.

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I come from Veera sandra. From there I took a local bus to Electronic city. to get 505 but even after waiting for long I did not get any so I got another bus which took me to Silk board. from there I got a bus to Marthahalli. from amarthahalli to Borewell stop another one.

I liked the travel but the conserns I have are as following.

• Busses are stopping in the bus stops for longer time to get tickets( not volvo, thanks to volvo drivers)
• Busses are not following traffic rules they need to follow lane rules.
• From marthahally to borewell it's lessthan 2 Km but ticket charge is not 3 but 5 they said it's a different zone. 
• all these which I have written is not to disappoint any one. but since I really want to enjoy bus for long.

Regards
Joe (Special Interest group Administrator, Syntillations, Logica) 

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Travel from Vidyaranyapura to Manyata Tech Park, Nagavara. There is one direct bus from vidyaranyapura to marathahalli which is the most convenient otherwise have to change 3 buses (2 if vpura->hebbal is available) + the last mile shuttle from MTP gate to the office or walk.

  As I could not figure out the bus timings (this route is not very frequent) from www.bmtc.info or btis web-site, dropped the idea and took the car.

I have a suggestion for long-distance buses. Long distance buses from say hebbal to silk-board can have some buses which do not stop every-where but at important junctions like (hebbal->nagavara->ramamurthynagar->KR Puram->marathahalli->kadubisanahalli->sarjapur junction) etc. This will result in faster travel for people. people wanting to get off in between say marathahalli->kadubisanahalli can get down at one of these stops and take the route stopping everywhere. these buses can transition to regular buses (stopping everywhere) during non-peak hours.

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Sorry for a late feedback,I am put up at Sultanpalya & have to travel to ITPL everyday. I dont have a direct bus from my place to ITPL so I had to take my office bus service. I dont know why BMTC is not looking an running Volvo Service from either Kaval Byrasandra ( Good Bus Stand), Sultanpalya,RT Nagar or Ganganagar. If you notice in the South of Bangalore BMTC has Volvo services as 500K,500KS,500KM from different parts to ITPL. For that matter there is no Volvo service from Sahakaranagar, Boopsandara, Nagashettyhalli all of this places have a lot of citizens travelling towards ITPL everyday. If given a choice I want to be part of a Bus Day every if a service is introduced so will be citizens of all these areas. If not a Volvo atleast the latest Tata Macopolo buses can be tested.

Request Praja team to kindly take up the above with BMTC staff.

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Dear Sunil Kumar

As you are staying in Sultanpalya you can reach the Ring Road from where you will get all the 500 busses, you will get Volvo buses every 15 minutes and the normal busses are there every minute, I always board from the Kempapura stop on the Ring Road.  I am doing this for the past 6 months and I enjoy the Volvo drive, now I don't feel like taking the car out.

From Sahakarnagar when you come out on the Airport Road you will get 500DA which is coming from Yelahanka and goes to Silk Board this bus is available frequently or you can reach the Hebbal  bus stop below the Flyover and you will get plenty of busses.

Initially I too had difficulties for 1 week but now I am very happy.

Regards

Murugan

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You should have got off at K.R.Puram and taken 304,306,308,319 series buses which go via Hoodi to ITPL. 304,306 series buses go towards Chennasandra but no volvoes.

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Hi All,

I live in Basavanagar & am equally concerned about poor connectivity with old airport road, despite the short 2km distance. On the other side, ie. from Vignannagar bus terminus via Malleshpalya & BEML gate, there are more buses.

I tend to agree with PublicTransportFan - last mile issues are actually easier than planning the more difficult long-haul routes. All it needs is a will & minibuses - planning routes is much easier.

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My residence and work place are both along the G12 route, one 250M away and the other some 600M away. Therefore, the bus day experiment turned out quite OK for me, compared to my daily bike commuting. But, what put me off totally was the terrible state of the foot-paths, bus stands, or what passes off for them. A lot more attention needs to be given to this if bus usage has to become the first choice with commuters.

Chandru
 

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 I Stay near basava nagar bus stop.

The only problem i face in using BMTC is the bus frequency from basava nagar to airport road.

Adding bus frequency to cover from basava nagar to airport road will be use full for many.

I use car now, if some bus is introduced between basava nagar bust stop to airport road sure i will switch to BMTC.

Thanks,

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