BMTC bus, road kerb and stands
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Written By silkboard - 26 September, 2008
It helps no one except the driver of the bus when he decides not to cut left and go closer to the kerb at bus stands. Folks have to walk up, or wait on the roads, and not at the shelter (if one exists in the first place). And the bus blocks traffic on the road.
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Reasons are plenty, BMTC says the bus stands are always occopied by either the autos or cabs, and what if a bus is already waiting at the stand, where does the other bus park? Okay, some reasons may be valid. But I just snapped a bus from inside as it went from Marathahalli to Domlur. 4 out of 8 stops were made far away from the kerb, and in only one case was the stand not empty (an auto was blocking). In this case at least, the driver of 411a was simply lazy to cut left and back right again, thats all. Captured some pictures for proof.
SB, more over this encorachment by passengers onto the road is a BIG safety hazard that is often over looked. Even a bus bay, seems to provide more place to stand than for the bus to actually park in!
I hear Mumbai has a very effective Queing system for local busses. I wish this could be implemented here as well. Right now when the bus arrives its survivial of the fittest who makes it through first!
Sometimes, I have seen Sub-Inspectors moving people back into the shelter/pavement, but thats like pushing a pack of attacking soldiers back, the minute u turn around they are back where they started!
Its hard to even come up with a solution other than Awareness Campaigns and Stricter enforcement. But you can't always expect a soldier to enforce law, somehow we have to find self disciplinary approach methods that drive it into people's heads!
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Bus Bays are pre-requsite for this and as can be seen from the above picture, hard markings will easily direct the busses to the lane, closer to the passengers and also not cause unwanted trouble to other road users..
Btw where are the promised bus bays??
Why is Praja bent upon listing issues at this level? I mean do we want to go ahead tackling each of these issues, or issue kinds, by hand? Does Praja now want to get into that model where in we stop looking at the city's (and the land's) problems holistically?
For instance aren't we going to look at buses stopping farther away from the pavements with the perspective of enabling better driver education at BMTC? at RTO? Better license authorising methodologies at the RTO? Better road design practices by the BBMP?
Are mere bus-bays going to hammer this problem down? Will drivers magically start driving their buses down these bus-bays soon as they see one? Will pedestrians magically stick to a queue in front of that bus-stop, soon as one such lane is painted on the road? BTW, will that paint stand the friction of the 6 tyres that will rub over it more than a 1000 times in a day?
I think we can go into whatever depth into understanding all the problems there are beneath this issue. But which ones does Praja want to handle here? The effect kinds? or the cause kinds?
I dont know how and where those snaps have been coming from (like the neat road above!), but I am very sure that place had a rather messy junction too sometime ago. That aside, I am also sure that we understand painting bays, making hard markings on roads is not the *solution* we need.. we need civic awareness and education - among people on and off the road. How do we achieve this - I guess that must be our homework.. (narayan82 had a point to this effect too)
-Nijavaada
following rules..education sounds very nice..also you are trying enforcement from the RTO end etc..very well
btw do you know the going price for a bus driver license renewal?
BMTC drivers are the immuned lot when it comes to ticketing by cops just cos they are from 'department'
On a 2 wheeler I would luv to be right behind a volvo cos he makes his way faster than a 2 wheeler even in heavy traffic!
and the list of gaps continue in order to rein them with process..
Instead if we introduce a hard turn out or a layby at important stops if not all..
The drivers will get used to bringing busses closer to the kerb
The passengers will avoid spilling onto the roads to catch the bus
Bus drivers will learn to move in a FIFO order from bus stops
etc,.
There are a couple layby's in blr which are very successful..check the one in front of Gopalan Mall..we can also have it clean and spanking like the one in my post pic at 6 AM
i am intersted and read through your write up twice. i dodnot understand. maybe because i am one of those who believes that engineering(or lack of it) has a lot to do with problems(including behavioural ones).
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