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-   -   Think Volvo Buses, think safety? Think again! (https://www.team-bhp.com/forum/commercial-vehicles/21192-think-volvo-buses-think-safety-think-again-5.html)

OT: There's an East & a West as well.....and Bihar doesn't fall in the North by any figment of imaginationlol:

PS: You could check out Mann Travels & Rajdhani Travels in North India....excellent buses & very well maintained, despite the "North" Indian ownership & employees:p

This is a common practice followed by many bus owners to keep the engine cool. There are some who keep the engine bay door open by 90 degrees (!!!) especially on 2-lane highways. I wonder whether it really serves much purpose.

Uh oh. If Volvos are so dangerous to be in, imagine the plight of commuters who travel in shady precarious tin boxes - specially our very famous Blue Lines and private buses built on truck chassis.
I donot agree with the news clip nor with the discussion title, because given the state of illiterate, insensitive, ruthless drivers we have, any good piece of machine is going to get ruined.

PS - Volvo is not naive as to disregard the proficiency of 3rd party body builders.

This appeared in THE HINDU Business Line, Mon. 19th Feb 2007.
quote...
Early in Feb 2007, the National University of Educational Planning and Administration (NUEPA) released a report on the Composite Education Development Index to track the progress of Indian States in providing universal elementary education to its children. The NUEPA exercise sought to rank the States on the basis of their performance at the primary and upper primary levels of education in terms of access, infrastructure, teachers and outcomes.

Not surprisingly, Kerala ranked first and Bihar last in the list of 35 States and Union Territories.

The worst performers are Bihar, Jharkhand, Arunachal Pradesh, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Assam.
Bihar and UP are the two States that remain in the ward of the other sickly northern States, collectively termed the BIMARU (an acronym for Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh) States.

If Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh have been able to break the shackles of poor performance, it is because they have been trying to follow Kerala's early efforts in the educational field.
...unquote

rl: That was hilarious - altho I'm sure the original author didnt intend that to sound funny. rl:

I've heard that bus drivers in Kerla are pretty suicidal. So I dont think this metric allows us to conclude anything concrete.

Interesting. Suicidal, you say !? Where did you hear this viewpoint, Mpower?
Could you share some report that can be refered to and discussed.

They're not suicidal. They're homicidal.

I would like to point out another misuse of Volvo buses by Private Operators.

Since the B7R buses do not have roof top luggage rack, private bus operators load everything in the luggage bay including motorcycles, parcels etc and more often than not it is over loaded.

I was travelling from Bangalore to Munnar one night and observed that the bay was filled fully with lead acid batteries which I am sure would have weighed few tonnes.

On top of this the driver started racing with another volvo in the ghats and this bus was bottoming when going over the undulating road at high speeds. On one particularly bumpy turn, the bus bottomed out so heavily that some thing broke(some suspension part I guess) and for the rest of the rest of the journey we were getting loud suspension noises from the rear.

This kind of abuse will weaken a tank, forget a Volvo

BIMARU...Nice acronym, hearing it for the first time...
Amazing to see UP and Rajasthan in this list...

I thought Rajasthan was far above looking at its rich cultural heritage and also heard during my college days that Jaipur is one of the best planned cities after Chandigarh...
I stayed in Kanpur during my 4 years of Engg. Although The local tempo wallahs used to say that Bihar is highly corrupted, I didnt realize this state of such a pathetic state, may be I lived inside IITK campus and it is a different world altogether...

Now, I have started to wonder what is that Big B's ad about? "UP mein zulm kaam hai, yeh kendra ke report kehti hai"

Abhi

On this very forum, not too long ago. A search should lead you to that thread.

A further hint would be the Street Experiences section.
Actually there are many threads of the same nature there.

As per the road accident data compiled by the National Transportation Planning and Research Centre (NATPAC), Kerala has become the second most accident-prone State in the country after Maharashtra. The total number of accidents recorded in 2004 was 41,306. Of the 41,306 accidents, 11,106 took place in the National Highway stretches passing through the State, 5,184 in State Highway and the remaining in other roads.
A study conducted by the Alcohol & Drug Information Centre (ADIC)- India revealed that around 40% of the road accidents have occurred because the driver was under the influence of alcohol. In the case of accidents in national highways, more than 72% was related to drink driving. The number of Road accidents in Kerala has a close link to the alcohol per-capita consumption in the State. Kerala has the highest per capita consumption of alcohol in the country and hence it is not surprising that in Road Accidents too Kerala tops the country’s list.
Around 15% of Kerala's population drink. The per capita consumption of alcohol as per figures of 2006 is 8.3 litres in Kerala (National - 4 litres, Punjab - 7.9 litres)

Kerala has 145,704 of roads (4.2% of India's total). This translates into about 4.62 km of road per thousand population, compared to an all-India average of 2.59 km. Virtually all of Kerala's villages are connected by road. Traffic in Kerala has been growing at a rate of 10–11% every year, resulting in high traffic and pressure on the roads. Kerala's road density is nearly four times the national average, reflecting the state's high population density. Add to this the high number of private buses plying on the roads of Kerala. There is stiff competition between buses and they drive really fast. To curb such a trend between Aluva and Kochi, punching stations were established at two points where every private bus had to punch their cards to ensure that they did not arrive before time! But they continue to compete and drive fast and kill time just before they reach the punching stations.

The government is now trying to implement fixing of speed governors to all buses and trucks - the deadline for which is April 15 I believe.

Road accidents in Kerala

Now coming back to Volvo buses and tour operators!!
Volvo buses and even other buses plying long distance routes drive extremely fast without any regard to the conditions of the road, bus or passengers. Some Volvo bus owners are allegedly running their buses on keerosene (in Maharashtra). They try to recover their investment as soon as possible which is why they simply do not take the vehicle for regular servicing. And any mechanical gadget without proper maintenance will start to fall apart.

Volvo is working on making a collision free world. For more detials read on.

Volvo's Vision: A car that cannot crash- Auto-Specials-The Economic Times

In my experience, Kerala is the only state where cars give way to speeding and overtaking buses. They sure drive like maniacs. My experiences with Kerala RTC are limited to travelling from Ernakulam/Kottayam to Pampa and back to Ernakulam but they sure drive like their bottom is on fire. On the ghats from Erumely to Pampa their driving is even more rash, with utter disregard to other vehicles and they browbeat the smaller vehicles with their bulk. On those twisty roads one should always be aware of the tail of the overtaking bus. Atleast a quarter of the passengers vomit on that stretch.