Whether you’re in Bangalore for a few days, or you’re moving residence, here are 10 things I want you to know about the transportation and traffic that might be different from your city!
1. Distance is measured in minutes taken to travel from place to another, not by the kilometres! Why? Because 1 km might take 15 minutes on a fine Monday morning or 2 on a Saturday night, no kidding!
2. You won’t find rikshas, and you’ll rarely find the 7+ passenger autos. You’ll have to make do with ordering a cab, taking a local bus or learning to bargain with private autowalas.
3. Most cabs dont know how to get to your location or take you to the destination. So make sure you have Google maps with you and a 3G Internet connection to navigate yourself and the cab around the city, lest you get lost in some “halli“.
4. In the more-crowded areas, there are ridiculous amounts of road blocks and forced diversions such as no u-turn or no straight-way from a certain point that can possibly make the time taken to teach a place double.
5. The metro line connects a very minimal section of the city, so if you’re a Delhiite like myself who’s been taking the Delhi Metro Service for granted, you’re going down a guilt trip here!
6. The concept of travelling by meter is a myth. You are bound to pay some multiple (1.5x, 2x) of the actual charges.
7. People don’t seem to understand the concept of car pooling. If you will observe, on an average 9 out of 10 cars only have one person! That’s a lot of pollution and traffic for a city that’s expanding exponentially! So if you’re one of those who drive to work, please stop complaining that there’s so much traffic, and rather try to reduce the traffic that you are contributing to!
8. Buses are quite comfortable, but expensive! You can always consider tempo-travelers and non-AC buses.
9. People driving on the road won’t try to run you over if you’re trying to cross the road. As a matter of fact, atleast a dozen times, people have gone out of their way to stop and let you pass by!
10. And last but not the least. Traffic police takes its work very seriously! As an example, once a group of friends and I were talking to an autowala to go somewhere, and he told us he’s already due for a pickup. A lady police officer saw the situation and promptly went to the driver, inspecting why (having assumed this) he was charging us beyond the meter. Faith in humanity restored!
