[Chetan_Rao]

Originally Posted by am1m

... Occasionally I need to head to that part of town and so far I've been getting down at Kengeri and walking to past the NICE road junction...

My parents live pretty equidistant from Kengeri and Challaghatta stops, while Decathlon Mysore Rd is much closer to the Kengeri stop, plus there is a footpath right up to the Emperor Legacy restaurant at the first outbound NICE interchange. I think Kengeri will stay my choice of stop for a while until usability improves at Challaghatta (hopefully soon before anyone gets hurt).

[am1m]

Mods: please consider moving this thread under "Street Experiences". A Metro is really about moving people across city streets and slowly, even the 'Bangalore traffic' threads on the forum (currently under 'street experiences') are also beginning to reference the Metro more frequently.

[DigitalOne]

Now that the missing link is open, everybody wakes up to the fact that there are not enough trains to mitigate the crushing crowd, and to BMRCL's very poor planning .

To maintain a healthy frequency of three to four minutes, experts say, BMRCL should have one train per kilometre. In Phase 1, BMRCL had 50 trains for 45 km, but there are only 57 trains now, even though the total network length has increased to 73 km.

In the last 5-6 years since phase 1 was completed, there has been an addition of just 7 trains!!

When will the new coaches arrive?

In December 2019, the China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation (CRRC) Nanjing Puzhen Co. Ltd. was awarded the contract to supply 216 coaches, with an expected delivery to BMRCL within 173 weeks. Out of the 216 coaches, 126 (21 six-coach trains) will be deployed on the Purple and Green lines, while the remaining 90 coaches (15 six-coach trains) are designated for the under-construction Yellow Line (RV Road-Bommasandra). However, not one train set has reached Bengaluru so far.

The first two metro trains from CRRC are expected to be shipped from China on October 18 and should arrive in Bengaluru within a month.

Following this, Titagarh plans to deliver 12 cars each month to fulfil the order within the timeline of March 2025. BMRCL intends to deploy these trains on the Yellow Line initially and subsequently induct them into the Purple and Green Lines.

Source: Moneycontrol

So the only hope is that the Yellow line gets delayed a lot and these new trains (2 per month) are deployed by BMRCL for the purple or green lines.

ps - My estimate for Yellow line being operational is at least 9-10 months away i.e June-July 24.

[audioholic]

Originally Posted by DigitalOne

So the only hope is that the Yellow line gets delayed a lot and these new trains (2 per month) are deployed by BMRCL for the purple or green lines.

That will mostly not happen due to the signalling systems on these rakes being different. And between the yellow line and purple/green lines there is no possibility of rake exchange.

Absolute lack of foresight and planning. The yellow line and green line run parallel at RV Road station and yet there was no thought about enabling a loop line between the two. The only possibility of rake exchange I see is via Yellow line to Blue line at silk board, and then blue line to purple at BYPL yard and so on.

On the other hand, I woke up late and ended up taking metro to office. It was pretty decent considering my start time was late and commute by car would have taken 1:30hr.

Started from my house in Banashankari at 8:45AM.
Reached National College Metro including parking at 8:55AM.
Thanks to five minute frequency of Green line, boarded train at 8:57AM
Switched to Purple line also running at 5min frequency at 9:03AM
Deboarded purple line at Kundanahalli(SAP Labs) 9:45AM
Immediately got a BMTC normal bus below the station and it dropped me bang in front of our tech park Brigade Tech Gardens at 9:55AM.

It was very seamless and no pain points anywhere. Purple line was under crush load between Majestic to MG road after which it got pretty good and I also managed to get a seat after MG road.

So I have decided to take metro when there will be heavy traffic and if I dont manage to start early to office. Otherwise its car for me.

[condor]

I wish I had enough detail of what actually happened in deciding which line to prioritize, and which line was more feasible to implement (in totality) first. Both at a local level and from the view of the central/GoI body that finances these projects across the country.

Having said that, traffic and commute will become easier once we have both the upcoming lines completed - the Yellow line for commuters on Hosur Road side, and the lines along ORR and the Bellary Road/Airport road line. If we cant wait, then can do what ever else one wants to do

[motorworks]

I have been working in Bangalore for 18-19 years now and have never used public transport as my primary form of commute to work. However, im now fortunate to have a metro station right at my apartment society entrance ( Garudcharpalaya, Purple line).

And the start of the full fledged operation on the purple line coincided with my office shifting to Dairy Circle! So i tried this option, in the morning took the metro from Garudcharpalaya to MG road station, and thereafter opted for an auto rickshaw from the MG metro to my office. Total commute time 45 minutes. In the evening i was told that commuting from my office to MG is difficult, so i took an auto to the Jayanagar metro station and then rode the Green line to Majestic, shifted to purple line at the Majestic to go all the way back to Garudcharpalaya. This whole journey from my office entrance took about 1 hour and 15 minutes.


If i look at the overall commute time, im guessing me travelling by car would almost be the same owing to my office location being in a different area where there is no metro connectivity. However i find the metro way of commute time to be a bit more reliable, unlike the unpredictable traffic situations one may face on the road. But its not easy though, the metro is very crowded during the evening.

Lets see how it goes, i have no work from home option in my field of work, so going to office everyday is a routine. Will keep trying the metro option as much as possible.

[deehunk]

As of late, we are witnessing very rude behaviour by staff at Metro stations. The first incident happened on October 16th at Jayanagar Metro station. The staff at the counter were reluctant to issue daily passes and kept on moving us between counters until I started shouting. The station in charge rushed to the scene, warned the staff, and helped us get the pass. Today another incident happened at Chikpete, where a female security staff member behaved very rudely for asking about missing sign boards for toilets inside the station. Since I travel frequently by metro, it is very common to see the staff behaving rudely with passengers.

[puntra800]

Originally Posted by deehunk

As of late, we are witnessing very rude behaviour by staff at Metro stations. The first incident happened on October 16th at Jayanagar Metro station. The staff at the counter were reluctant to issue daily passes and kept on moving us between counters until I started shouting. The station in charge rushed to the scene, warned the staff, and helped us get the pass. Today another incident happened at Chikpete, where a female security staff member behaved very rudely for asking about missing sign boards for toilets inside the station. Since I travel frequently by metro, it is very common to see the staff behaving rudely with passengers.

I travel pretty frequently on the greenline between Doddakallsandra and Dasarahalli, what I noticed off late is there is a mixture of Private and Government staff at the stations. Right from security where I believe home guards were introduced in place of private security folks. Maybe this has got in the sarkari babu attitude of this is all you get, take it or leave it.

The other aspect could maybe be lacklustre incentives provided, it has been sometime since the considerable strech of metro has opened and maybe the employees are losing the initial enthusiasm they were having and are expecting more from the employer.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by deehunk

As of late, we are witnessing very rude behaviour by staff at Metro stations.

So far, the security staff haven't really had too much to do. The Bangalore Metro is only now going to start seeing some sort of crowds. When you don't have too much work, you tend to do things that are not required and throw your authority around unnecessarily. Like analyze each and every thing in peoples' bags on the security scanner, like they have time to do now at some under-used stations! That will all quickly come to an end once the crowds start using the metro, they are going to have their hands full and will be forced to become efficient.

Originally Posted by deehunk

The attitude of staff at ticket counters has to be rectified;...but in practice, they have made their own rules of what to do and what not to do.Most of the crowd never really questions this...

Yes, they tend to do that. By all means we have to complain. Ask for the complaint book (they will never tell you about it) and record the complaint. Enough people do that, things will change. The staff at the Indiranagar Metro station used to make up their own rules for when one of the entrances would be open or closed! Often there would be a jam at the main entrance, when another perfectly good entrance was shut, even in the afternoon! Many of us regular commuters started complaining and making a fuss about that. Now it works as required.

[deehunk]

The attitude of staff at ticket counters has to be rectified; on paper, they are responsible for tickets or daily passes, but in practice, they have made their own rules of what to do and what not to do.Most of the crowd never really questions this, so they take it for granted. In fact, the sign boards inside the stations, lack of information about metro feeder services, and boarding points show a lack of knowledge in managing metro stations.

[adisan]

Namma Metro Grievance Redressal System

Quite efficient and responsive based on my few interactions. Only thing is that they have a practice of closing a ticket instead of putting it in "on hold" or "awaiting customer response" state when additional information is needed from us. In such cases, opening a new ticket for the same issue including the missing information works.

[am1m]

Happy to see the crowds on the Purple Line, towards Whitefield in the morning and back in the evening! Shows that if you build it, they will come. We can find excuses to not use public transport (and the Metro still has a long way to go), or find a way to make it work for us. Enough people seem to be making it work already. May it go from strength to strength! It has personally changed my life, making it possible to avoid a lot of Bangalore traffic and I'm so much happier and healthier because of that.

[m8002?]

Originally Posted by am1m

Happy to see the crowds on the Purple Line, towards Whitefield in the morning and back in the evening! Shows that if you build it, they will come. We can find excuses to not use public transport (and the Metro still has a long way to go), or find a way to make it work for us. Enough people seem to be making it work already. May it go from strength to strength! It has personally changed my life, making it possible to avoid a lot of Bangalore traffic and I'm so much happier and healthier because of that.

True that. I think the tipping point will be when the Blue line ( Silk board, KR Puram, Hebbal ) becomes operational. Hope that doesnt get delayed

[puntra800]

Originally Posted by m8002?

True that. I think the tipping point will be when the Blue line ( Silk board, KR Puram, Hebbal ) becomes operational. Hope that doesnt get delayed

Not to forget the Yellow line and Pink line, there are still quite a few people who travel towards bommanahalli industrial area and ecity.
Pink Line I would say will be helpful in connecting the commercial areas with residential ones which is also helpful

[am1m]

BMRCL is making a good attempt to manage with the lack of train coaches/sets and to clear the rush between crowded sections. Noticed that the frequency at peak hour is different now for opposite directions on the Purple Line. Used to be a set, matching frequency both ways before, depending on the time of day. Now I see that the Whitefield-Mys Rd frequency is more than the opposite direction at the same time in the evening (4mins, vs 7mins). I think they are also running shorter loops, ITPL-MG Road, ITPL-Majestic.

Hope the expected train sets arrive double quick and hope they also crack the 4-minute frequency mark, since extending the number of coaches doesn't seem to be an option due to station length. (Hope they are fixing that at the new stations at least!)

Edit: Just saw in a news article that trains are already running at a 3-minute frequency between MG Road and Majestic at certain times in the morning.