Wednesday, June 13, 2007

#5 Bangalore Traffic:

#define Bangalore South Bangalore

Well this is one topic I wanted to write on since my first blog. But of course there were other more important things to blog about then.

It is not that am fazed by the jams and the long waits at those signals, I have witnessed all those in Mumbai as well. What irritates is the huge difference in the reason for the occurrence of the same event in these two diff cities.

If I may give a rough estimate in Mumbai for the jams , 75% of the time the infrastructure would be the reason. The potholes in Mumbai need no introduction to any one and how can I not mention the great ability of the BMC and other service bodies to dig up any and all the roads possible.

But if you search for a reason in Benagaluru, the credit goes to the great TRAFFIC and ROAD SENSE that the people in general have.
let make it very clear... Miserable and Pathetic are not enough to describe it.

Of course am talking about the majority and NOT ALL of them. I have spotted diamonds in this coal field but they are too few to get noticed and most of the times found suffering at the hands of the majority.
The ratio would go as 90:10 for people:infrastructure responsible for the bad traffic conditions.
Am giving that 10% to infra just to cover the at times insane ONE-WAYs that they keep dynamically changing.

(I know there are gonna be a few voices raised at this one, but cant ignore the truth guys.
In case you agree with me well and good and incase not....
WEll it really doesnt matter na.. its my blog and its my vote that rulzz here. :D )


Actually, how much ever i try i cant muster enough words and sentences to portray my heart felt feelings for the same.

What i can do here is .. pen down the unstated but hard wired rules of driving a vehicle on the roads of Bangalore that i have found till date.

THE COMMANDMENTS

1) Entire road is your property and yours alone. Nobody else is supposed to be on it while you are.

2)Thou shall not be ready to wait at any junction , unless the lord (pandu) is standing right in front of your vehicle.

3)Thou shall not allow any one to over take from the right. It is the biggest sin thou can ever commit and thou shall be sent to CHENNAI* to manage auto traffic out there.

4)Thou shall never be dependent on the availability of a tar road to drive thy two wheeler.

5)Thou shall not give signals while switching lanes on YOUR own road.

6)If thy vehicle is the slowest on the road then thou shalt drive it on the right lane of a two lane road. Incase it is a single lane road thou shalt drive it right in the center of it.

Auxiliary Clause: Thou shall never ever follow lane rules and drive at the right most space available on the road.

7)If thou is driving a BUS or a lorry, thou shall ignore the presence of all the vehicles in thy vicinity. In case the subject is making his presence felt , please understand he has already testated a will and written a suicide note. Thou shall do all in your power to arrange the subjects meeting with the almighty.

8)If thou finds a brethren on the road thou shall take thy bus right next to his so that thou can block the entire road to make sure nobody troubles thy brethren.

9)If thou art driving an Auto, thou shall never get an emission test done on thy vehicle and drive like a serial killer whose only aim is to kill atleast 10 bike riders everyday (pillion riders are excluded from the count, are to be considered as bonus).

11) Thou shall drive the vehicle on full beam ALWAYS with in the city limits. This is a universal rule and is also applicable is you are gonna drive on Mumbai roads.

12)Even though thou wants to go straight thee shall be on the left lane and make sure the subject who wants to take a free left turn shall not be able to do it.

13)If thou are a TAXI/CAB driver, driving like a lady driver shall not suffice at any cost. Thou shall how to master the art of driving like a girl, driving at 100kph spots a cockroach under her seat.

Pedestrian decree:
- Not having wheels is no reason to feel low. It is still YOUR own road and you can stand anywhere on it at any given time.
- You shall not look and care about the traffic flying in your direction from the lane closer to you.
HE WILL HAVE TO STOP NO MATTER WHAT.
You would concentrate only on the traffic on the far lane of the road.


Authors Note:
I) Since i live in south bangalore all my encounters and discoveries were local. I have almost no idea how the traffic sense is on the other parts of the city, but it is the optimist with in me that wants to give a chance and believe that it is better than down here in south, hence the initial hash defining of the name to restrict the context to South Bangalore.
AM i a coder or what!!!!!

II) * - I have never visited CHENNAI, but have heard from reliable sources (PM who hails from the city and other seniors) that the condition in bangalore is a lot better than in chennai.. Well i aint dumb to not get the point after that.

6 comments:

Bhargav said...

And this fits perfectly with Charles Dicken's theory of "Survival of the fittest"... Thou shall not pay heed to any of the rules for safety of life..
There is one important clause you missed out.. Thou shall be equipped with all the kannada slangs to be fired one after the other against auto drivers..

On a more serious note, half of Bangalore's traffic mess is because of the IT company shuttles..Our very own cabs leaving at 6.30 and the rush to leave before that serves as a testimony to that fact. The other quarter is because of autos... They are cockroaches with 3 wheels.. If a cockroach can shove one of its whisker through a hole, it manages to squeeze itself through the hole..If the nose of the auto fits in the gap between 2 vehicles - VOILA!
Secondly, I'm not sure if you've observed this (plus, you've seen most of South Bangalore only)..Me feels that each area has a particular pattern of driving.. When you are on KR Road or South End Road, you can guess the kind of flow of the traffic.. Atleast that's what I feel.. Same is the case with North B'lore.. But the flow in th North aint the same as the flow in the South though there aint much difference in the density of traffic... (Did I confuse you??? )

Shariq said...

Well done kaushal.....very aptly written... i totally agree with you. I thought traffic in calcutta was the worse ever but heer bangalore beats evrybody....nice work !!!!

Karthik said...

Dude look at things in a positive sense, you are becoming a better driver day by day....I bet u can give schumi a run for his money someday...

Unknown said...

For a moment I felt I just time traveled the Shakespeare era with all that 'thou' 'thee', Thanks to Mrs. Sheril ( my English teacher, Man she was sexy!! Believe me) who used to teach a bit of Shakespearean English..
I just wish you all visit my place, Belgaum. You can travel the breadth of the city in flat 40 mins ( peak time)!!
And Dude, the verity of your commandments is unquestionable..

Ann M said...

shailesh even i think our pal has been reading R&J,tempest etc these past few days!!
well that heading can be rephrased to "Indian Traffic"cos i think this problem exists pretty much everywhere.! n dude u forgot to tell about cows n goats n other creatures which add to the menace..!
being a two n four wheel driver i ve noticed one thing, when u driving a car u tend to curse 2-wheelers for unruly driving while u urself act the same way when on a 2-wheeler.! :)

kd said...

@bhargav:
with reference to " Rash Driving"
guess the theory in this context changes to " survival of the rashest" if the term makes sense at all...

@othla:
schumi uh...
Not bad... would love beat like ALonso did [:)]

@Ann:
Correction: Indian Traffic.. would just not fit the bill here...
Dont try and generalize the condition out here is far far pathetic than other at par places in india...