Tag: Purple Faeries

After A Roaring Start, BEST Now Backtracks on Minibuses

After an amazing start in the last two months using its new minibuses, BEST has now decided to do something rather silly.

To give a background, these buses are super popular. In my previous post, I had mentioned the routes back then. Since then, BEST has added a few new routes in Andheri.

A-252 goes to Sardar Vallabhai Patel Nagar, A-266 and A-268 to Swami Samarth Nagar Circle (Lokhandwala Market), A-203 goes to Juhu Bus Station and A-221 has been extended to Natasha Towers.

BEST further extended the services from Andheri to Jogeshwari, running then on A-180 from Jogeshwari Bus Station to Oshiwara Depot and A-234 running from Jogeshwari to Lokhandwala.

BEST also announced two new routes from Wadala Station, A-174 from Wadala Station (West) to Bharani Naka and A-110 to Vidyalankar (Sangam Nagar).

The Wadala lot was flagged of by newly sworn in cabinet minister Aaditya Thackeray.

Junior Thackeray was instrumental in bringing in Humboldt Penguins from North Chile to Mumbai in 2016, where they were housed at the Veermata Jijabhai Udhyan (Byculla Zoo) prior to the untimely death of one of them. He was also pushing for more nightlife back in 2017, a move I had supported.

Also Read: More Nightlife In Mumbai Is Great But Can We Also Focus On Improved Public Transport?

BEST’s success in Andheri resulted in auto-rickshaws crying foul. BEST officials estimate that with an average of 12 trips a day per bus, it has affected nearly 5,292 auto rides per day. Of course, naysayers will be present. One expert questioned why BEST decided to send in such a large contingent to Andheri. The answer to that is simple: Trial and Error.

Why did BEST suddenly go on this path? They had after all cancelled all its AC routes after half a year of trying out happy hours and discounted fares, which did seem to be working. But they had burnt their fingers too much. The existing fleet of Purple Faeries had to be converted to a non-AC fleet, now mostly seen in SoBo.

It all began with former Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis appointing IAS officer Praveen Pardeshi as the Municipal Commissioner of Mumbai. After a six day-strike in December 2018-January 2019, and mounting losses of ₹1,000 crore, Pardeshi overrided BEST’s autonomy and provided a grant of ₹2,000 that allowed the undertaking to stand on its feet again.

Now, keeping these experiments in mind, BEST has altered some routes. As states earlier, A-221 now travels to Natasha Towers. A-249 has an additional stop at Dhake Colony. A-251 unfortunately travels only between Versova-Yari Road and Seven Bungalows while A-242 seems cancelled. A-257 is a ring route that goes from Andheri Station to JVPD Circle via JP Road and Link Road but then turns onto Gulmohar Road before reaching the station via Juhu Gali (CD Barfiwala Marg).

BEST has since launched a plethora of routes in SoBo as well. (Ignore the date, it should read 2020 instead of 2019.) Buses from Churchgate and CSMT to Ballard Pier, the Gateway of India, and Dr Syama Prasad Mukherjee Chowk (Museum). The Buses are A-122, A-111, A-112 and A-101. BEST has also cancelled A-54 and A-55 due to low patronage.

While this fleet is based on diesel buses, BEST runs A-167 from Comrade P K Kurne Chowk in Worli to Prabhadevi Station (West), A-352 from Rani Lakshmi Chowk (Sion Circle) to Trombay, A-302 from Rani Lakshmi Chowk to Maharana Pratap Chowk/Mulund Check Naka Bus Station using the Olectra Midi-bus fleet that are electric buses.

Now, BEST will also receive a batch of 500 midi CNG powered buses from Tata. Ten of them have already made their way to the Mumbai Central Depot.

In the midst of this, came some bad news.

Now, while the reason specified is ‘Administrative’, it doesn’t take a genius to know what’s going on here. If you really must know, look up who all form the current government, then read my first post on BEST’s AC buses followed by this article I had written for OpIndia.

The curious case of BEST and its AC buses

The ‘BEST’ scamster Indians should know about – Congress and the Khobragades have a lot to explain

Is BEST slipping back to its old ways?

Featured image by Karthik Nadar on Twitter.

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BEST’s New AC Buses Are A Delight To Travel On

A few months ago, BEST decided to slash its fares along the Delhi model. While I’m not to fond of the new fare structure, it has worked. Empty buses are now full. Crowds have shifted from autos to buses and sometimes, even the Metro has less crowd.

Under the new fare structure; the minimum fare for non-AC buses (regular, limited and express is ₹5 for 0-5km, ₹10 for 5-10km, ₹15 for for up to 15km and ₹20 for further distances. The corresponding fare for AC buses is ₹6, ₹13, ₹19 and ₹25 respectively.

BEST has now started to bring back their AC buses, expanding on the earlier fleet of Tata Starbus Diesel-Electric Hybrids operating on BKC routes. It has introduced Electric AC buses built by Olectra (formerly Goldstone) along with AC mini-buses (my transit group calls them postvans) that seat 21 passengers. These mini-buses are diesel-powered buses that are manufactured by Force Motors and have been contracted by BEST on a wet lease – wherein the driver also belongs to the lessor. While Olectra’s buses are on Wet Lease from them, the mini-buses are on lease from several agencies (indicated either on the front and rear of the bus next to the depot name and on the MV Act declaration on the side).

Buses supplied to Oshiwara Depot have come from an operator called Hansa City Bus (HCB).

Some routes such as AS51 (shares the same route as 51 from Colaba Depot to Santacruz Depot) and AS-6 (same as 6Ltd from Colaba Depot to Tata Power, Chembur) share the same routes as their non-AC counterparts, while some don’t.

BEST started deploying these mini-buses under a conductor-less model at Andheri Station (West). Several routes have been pushed into action. A-251, A-249 and A-221. While the former two run from Andheri Station (West) to Seven Bunglows (Saat Bangla) Bus Station with a stop at Four Bungalows (Char Bangla), the latter runs to Juhu Vile Parle Bus Station (JVPD) with a stop at Juhu Shopping Centre.

Also Read: Conductor-less buses: A boon or a bane?

From Andheri (West) Bus Station, the following are the routes:

  1. A-221 Andheri Station (W) <=> JVPD Bus Station
  2. A-235 Andheri Station (W) <=> Monginis Cake Company (Citi Mall)
  3. A-242 Andheri Station (W) <=> Monginis Cake Company (City Mall)
  4. A-248 Andheri Station (W) <=> Ramesh Nagar
  5. A-249 Andheri Station (W) <=> Seven Bungalows Bus Station
  6. A-251 Andheri Station (W) <=> Seven Bungalows Bus Station
  7. A-254 Andheri Station (W) <=> Veera Desai Road Police Station

From Andheri (East) there is only one AC bus and that is BKC-16 from Agarkar Chowk to SEEPZ Village. This is a regular bus (with a conductor) and uses the Tata Starbus Hybrid buses that belong to the Dharavi Depot.

Thankfully, them Purple Faeries are no longer around.

The timings for most of these buses (not all) are available on BEST’s app, BEST प्रवास (Prawas) that can be downloaded here for Android and here for iOS/Apple devices.

This post is dedicated to my friend Yash, who’s been an ardent supporter of my writing. You can follow Yash on Twitter @Yash_Railfan

Featured image is of a mini-bus at Andheri Bus Station, image credits Karthik Nadar. You can follow Karthik on Twitter @karthikist.

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BEST Tries Out New Colours; Asks For Feedback

Mumbai: BEST has repainted a few of its buses with a new colour scheme and has asked for feedback on them.

 

 

The Press Note is mentioned below:

As

Press Note on New Colours
Press Note on New Colours

As per the Press Note, the newly colour buses will run from 27 April to 30 April on Route 111 between Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus to Gateway of India. Feedback on the new livery can be sent to probestundertaking@gmail.com

Now, for the new livery itself. BEST has replaced its trademark red colour with a white livery and yellow stripes.

Non AC BEST bus with new livery
Non AC BEST bus with new livery

Along with this, the BEST logo on the side has also changed marginally.

They seem to have repainted some of the Purple Faeries as well, in spite of them being pulled out of service.

Howver

AC BEST bus with new livery
AC BEST bus with new livery

However, the new livery looks grand on the Cerita bus.

Let’s see what happens. Don’t forget to send your feedback.

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BEST Suspends All A/C Routes

No, this is not an April Fool’s joke. Not even close to one.
BEST has announced that beginning 17 April 2017, operations of all AC buses will be suspended. This information was announced via a Press Note dated 13 April 2017.

BEST Press Note suspending AC services
BEST Press Note suspending AC services

This is a really sad thing. Mumbai is a huge city with a large number of vehicles. Cancelling AC buses would mean people will opt for cars/bikes/taxis.

BEST was among the first to introduce AC buses, way back in 1998. Things began going downhill when in 2007, then General Manager Uttam Khobragade (named in the Adarsh Scam along with his daughter Devyani Khobragade of the US Underpaid Maid infamy) procured Cerita buses by fakely claiming that they were Chinese Kinglong buses.

This is really a sad day for Mumbai. BEST had done all that it could in the last few months, from slashing fares, to introducing Happy Hours, to reintroducing cancelled AC bus routes. This is indeed a bad moment for us.

Featured Image: AS-524. (Photo Credit: Sameer More)

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The Propaganda of Transport

Propaganda is a very misused, overused and abused word today. Politicians use it all the time to attack each other. In such cases, we should take a closer look at the word Propaganda itself.

Merriam-Webster defines Propaganda as ideas or statements that are often false or exaggerated and that are spread in order to help a cause, a political leader, a government, etc.

Of course, we can take the liberty of interpreting Propaganda as a more open nature of promoting oneself or ones interests to an audience.

The most well known example of Propaganda is the 1940 film The Eternal Jew, directed by Fritz Hippler and produced by the Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels under the Deutsche Film Gesellschaft banner. The film was nowhere near subtle, and portrayed Jews as Uncivilised, Parasitic and worse. However, times have changed and propaganda in its current form is very subtle, often using bias to have its way.

In the recent times, propaganda has managed to make its way into the Transport sector too. When we say Propaganda in the Transport sector, we do not refer to naming stations, airports, roads and bridges after people. Mumbai has one major railway station and its airport named after Chhatrapati Shivaji. Bangalore has its central bus station and airport named after Kempegowda. This is a global phenomenon. New York’s major airport is named after former President John F Kennedy while it’s secondary airport is named after the 99th Mayor Fiorello La Gaurdia.

The propaganda we look at is subtle, and in some cases, not so subtle.

A Nationalistic Bus?

A BMTC Atal Sarige on route AS-6.
A BMTC Atal Sarige on route AS-6. Image copyright Binai K Sankar.

At first glance, the Atal Sarige operated by the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation [BMTC] looks like its livery is is draping the bus with the National Flag. But. It’s wrong. If you take a second look, you’d notice that the colour scheme is White, Green and Saffron/Orange. The party colours of the Bharatiya Janata Party [BJP]. Further, the name itself is a giveaway. Named after former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee of the BJP, the bus was meant to serve the poorest of the poor.

Note: If you’re Mumbai, the highest fare is on a bus with its route number starting with AS, and if you’re in Bangalore, it’d be the opposite.

And now, for a little Aesthetics.

A TSRTC Metro Luxury Volvo at Lingampally.
A TSRTC Metro Luxury Volvo at Lingampally. Image copyright LoveOfZ, CC-BY-SA 4.0 International, Wikimedia Commons.

Pink is known to be a very soothing colour. It is often used to calm inmates in prison.

However, the Telangana State Road Transport Corporation [TSRTC] bus above did not turn pink to soothe its commuters. Telangana State was formed in 2014, and the party that won a majority in its Assembly Elections was the Telangana Rashtra Samithi [TRS], whose party colour is Pink. Thus, everyone who sees the bus will remember the colour pink and every time there is a campaign by the TRS, people will be calm, because, Hey, Pink is a soothing colour.

Switching Colours

And now, for the most interesting, and perhaps most noteworthy form of Bus-based propaganda.

Welcome to Tamil Nadu, where all the various divisions of the Tamil Nadu State Transport Corporation [TNSTC], the Metropolitan Transport Corporation [MTC] of Chennai and the State Express Transport Corporation [SETC] are like Chamelons. Remember the phrase “गिरगिट की तरह रंग बदलना” (Girgit Ke Tarah Rang Badalna)? That’s what TNSTC/SETC/MTC buses do. Change colours; Every time the government changes. It’s like an unwritten part of the party manifesto.

Here’s a picture of an MTC bus taken in April 2011 below. It’s blue in colour. Blue is also a soothing colour, although I fail to understand why anyone would want to say ‘Feeling Blue’ to refer to Sadness.

A blue coloured MTC Semi Low Floor bus on route number 21G.
A blue coloured MTC Semi Low Floor bus on route number 21G. Image copyright Vinoth Thambidurai/CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported/Wikimedia Commons.

This picture was taken in April 2011, a month before the All India Anna Dravida Munnethra Kazhagam [AIADMK] government won the elections. Colour combinations were aplenty across Tamil Nadu. Some buses bore different shades of blue and yellow, some were white with Red, Yellow and Orange stripes across them, there were many.

Now, they are all uniform. While, I did mention Fragmentation in an earlier post, it would be great if each city had its own identity in terms of colours. Here, Tamil Nadu is one single entity in terms of coloured buses.

All long distance buses, including all SETC buses are now Green in Colour. They’re light green in colour with dark green stripes, or dark green in colour with light green stripes, depending on how you may want to look at them. Local buses, including all MTC buses all sport the same Brown-Beige combination which makes it look like the bus wasn’t washed at all. Perhaps a plan to not wash the buses regularly.

Below, is one such repainted bus, taken in 2013, belonging to TNSTC Coimbatore.

A TNSTC CBE bus at Vadavalli in Coimbatore.
A TNSTC CBE bus at Vadavalli in Coimbatore. Image copyright Faheem9333/CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported/Wikimedia Commons.

See, what did I tell you? Where did this come from? Some people tell me that the colour has to do with what happened before this repainting. Barely three-four months before the buses got this brown colour, they had a different colour.

An MTC bus in the intermediate colour scheme.
An MTC bus in the intermediate colour scheme. Image: The Hindu

Notice the colours? Notice the photo of Jayalalithaa on the windscreen? I know it’s a bit difficult to see it, but can you see it. In the picture, Jaya is seen wearing a saree that is the same colour as the Maroon on the bus. Her complexion matches the beige on the bus. Tada! When the paint jobs were done, all buses sported a huge photo of the Chief Minister on the front windshield on the left hand side.

And now, finally …

Green Leafy Vegetables Buses

They say, greens are good for health. They say Green is a sign of Eco-Friendliness. But, the leaves here don’t exactly say that do they?

An MTC Small Bus [Mini Bus].
An MTC Small Bus [Mini Bus]. Image: The Hindu
 While MTC curiously chose to name these buses as ‘Small Bus’, not ‘Mini Bus’, they also decided to put a few leaves on it. No points for guessing why. The AIADMK’s Party symbol is: Yes, that’s right, Two Leaves! But, wait! You can see four leaves on that bus! Simple: 2+2=4. The more the merrier. Two more leaves is just going to reinforce things into the commuters head.

Now, notice something common among all these Transcos mentioned? They’re all State-level bodies, not Municipal ones. You’ll never see BEST, AMTS, or PMPML like this. Why? Decentralisation of transport management ensures that while Municipal Bodies have the wherewithal to run the Transco, they won’t have the time or resources to go behind such trivial stuff. They’ll have more important stuff such as banners, roads, naming of Chowks to work in their favour.

On an unrelated note: Searching for Purple Faeries on Google leads you to the Tag Purple Faeries. I call this, Purple Propaganda..

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BEST slashed its AC fares by half. What happened then is obvious!

BEST recently slashed its AC fares by 50%. The results of this, while obvious, are quite shocking.

BEST also introduced several new routes: AS-71, AS-72, AS-318, AS-415.

Earlier, NMMT and TMT AC buses would always run full while BEST buses were like Chauffeur services, with one or two passengers in some of them. The reasons were clear: BEST used its Purple Faeries while the other two use Volvos, and further, BEST charged one and a half [1.5x] times what the other two charged.

But not any more. BEST’s minimum AC fares have come down from ₹30 to ₹15 while NMMT and TMT charge ₹20.

The Net Result?

BEST’s AC buses are seeing a higher patronage. BEST, whose ridership had fallen from 43lakh to 30lakh, is now trying to get it to 45lakh.

Take a look below and see how two AC buses are performing.

AS-318

This is AS-318 at Bandra Bus Station [East] towards the Bharat Diamond Bourse in Bandra Kurla Complex.

As you can see in the picture, the bus is quite full.

BEST bus AS-310.
BEST bus AS-310. Image copyright Coolguyz.

AS-415

This is AS-415 from Agarkar Chowk to SEEPZ. As you can see, the bus is full of passengers.

BEST bus AS-415.
BEST bus AS-415. Image Copyright Coolguyz.

When was the last time you saw a BEST AC bus full of passengers? 2009? 2010.

With BEST getting the new Tata Starbus Hybrid fleet soon, things are just going to improve.

Of course, as stated earlier, BEST needs to get rid of the Cerita fleet soon and go for more powerful Ashok Leyland, Corona, Scania and Volvo buses to sustain this increase in passengers.

BEST slashed its AC fares by half. What happened then will NOT blow your mind! Share on X

Images courtesy Coolguyz from Skyscrapercity.

Go ahead. Share this article. Share the joys of traveling in India’s Oldest Public Transport Company.

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BEST ups its Ante!

In a move that will revolutionise Mumbai’s transport, BEST has finally decided to go one level further and upped its services majorly.

Starting with the plan to ply Electric Hybrid buses in BKC, BEST has gone step further to convert some of its existing fleet into Electric buses.

In a very bold and revolutionary move, the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai [MCGM] has allocated ₹10crore to retrofit existing BEST buses with a a Lithium battery powered engine. A batch of five buses will be converted first on a trial basis. BEST has stated that the cost of conversion from Diesel or CNG to Electric buses has gone down from an earlier figure of ₹65lakh to ₹35lakh.

Back in February, shortly after the #MakeInIndia week, BEST announced a design overhaul for its buses. The existing 12 metre long buses have an overhang beyond the rear tyres of the bus that often gets damaged when the bus gets rear ended. In order to eliminate this, 300 new buses which are 11 metre in length are being procured. These new buses will also be fitted with plugpoints for charging phones.

A BEST Minibus running on Route 377. The new buses are expected to be slightly longer than these.
A BEST Minibus running on Route 377. The new buses are expected to be slightly longer than these. Image copyright Karthik Nadar, CC-BY-SA 3.0 Unported, available on the Wikimedia Commons.

Another major development is the proposal to introduce app-based ticketing on BEST buses.

BEST has announced that it will bring out 22-seater AC midi-buses with app-based booking on them.

The MCGM has budgeted ₹25 crores for 50 buses, that will be air-conditioned, fitted with a GPS-based tracker, besides offering WiFi, newspapers and drinking water. Conductors would wear a different uniform than the standard Khaki that they wear normally. This is a great exercise for branding the buses, and will help BEST create a better image for their fleet. The buses will primarily run on routes connecting Metro stations and local Railway stations, thus mainly acting as feeders.

Interesting ways have been taken by BEST to improve its image, especially for its ailing AC fleet that still continues to be dominated by the Purple Faeries.

With the completion of the Oshiwara Railway bridge as well as the conversion of the DC traction along the harbour line to AC, Railway services are going to get more efficient and BEST will have to match up to the Purple Dragons than run on the tracks. BEST will need to make its Red Warhorses and Red Minions [Regular and Minibuses] work smarter to ferry more people and earn more revenue to keep the city as awesome as it has been.

BEST is firing up a new weapon to make Mumbai better. Share on X

However, the greatest bit of Publicity that BEST can get right now is that after Uber founder Travis Kalanick took a BEST, a BEST Double Decker was used to ferry Prince Henry, Duke of Cambridge and his wife, Catherine, Dutchess of Cambridge.

Catherine, Dutchess of Cambridge and Prince William, Duke of Cambridge on a BEST Bus in Mumbai.
Catherine, Dutchess of Cambridge and Prince William, Duke of Cambridge on a BEST Bus in Mumbai. Image copyright respective owners.

When @KensingtonRoyal took a BEST bus in Mumbai Share on X

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The Hangman Returns

So, at the beginning of this month, it was announced that CIDCO and NMMC were planning a Cable Ropeway from Shivaji Showk, Vashi Bus Station to Teen Taki Chowk, Kopar Khairane Bus Station.

So, barely two weeks later, it turns out that CIDCO gave an in-principle approval to Tata Realty and Infrastructure Limited [TRIL] to prepare a Detailed Project Report [DPR] for the project. If approved, this would be done on the “Swiss Challenge” method, wherein when a tender is floated, in which TRIL will have the right of first refusal and get an opportunity to match the best offer.

Along with this, a new route has been proposed. Now here’s where it gets interesting. The new route, has been proposed from Vashi to Ghatkopar. Yes, you read that right. Vashi to Ghatkopar, across the Thane Creek. The proposal is to connect it to the Metro at Ghatkopar [which seems nearly impossible given that there is no land available near Ghatkopar]. However, it would be marginally easier to connect it to the Monorail. Or better. Connect it to Ghatkopar Depot. Get on to them Purple Faeries on AS-388 to Poisar Depot.

Now, what seems to be the problem here?

  1. Building a set of pillars for a ropeway from Vashi Bus Station to the Vashi Creek.
  2. Building a set of pillars in the wetlands occupied by mangroves on both sides of the creek.
  3. Building a set of pillars on the actual creek.
  4. Crossing the Eastern Express Highway, building in Ghatkopar, and reaching the station.

So at the end of the day, this will be a super problematic thing to build. However, if they are able to build it, I, for one, would be super happy.

The issues here are:

  • Permissions to build over wetlands and the creek itself.
  • Variations in height. Most Ropeways/Cable Cars have a fixed gradient. This stretch would require the alignment to go up and down multiple times.
  • Turns. Again, most systems have a straight route. This one would require zig-zags.

However, the Vashi to Kopar Khairane plan is a brilliant idea. For starters, it would ease traffic on the Trans-Harbour line, the Thane-Belapur Road, as well as the Vashi Bus Station Road. Besides this, it will also provide a brilliant an scenic view of the entire city. While in most parts of Mumbai, the West saw development, in Navi Mumbai, barring Nerul and CBD Belapur, it was mostly the East, along the Highway that grew faster. It’s time to revolutionise our nations’ transport systems, and what better way to do it than the Mumbai Metropolitan Region!

 

 

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Travelling with your television

So, I was randomly going thru the internet when this one thing stood out: Tata Sky Transfer. I couldn’t resist, so I went thru all the possible search results and came across this video:

It is a very interesting thought and I personally feel this would work wonders to provide a comfortable mode of transport for us. As you know, we spend quite a lot of travel time to work. Now imagine this scenario, I work at the World Trade Centre in Cuffe Parade, and I live in Thane. My work times are such that I am unable to catch the A8Express, so I end up catching AS1. Now I have to contend with sitting on that bus from 8am to 10am to reach work and sit from 7.30pm to 10pm on my way back as it makes its way thru Sion, Dadar, Parel and Byculla. I’m spending close to five hours of those in a bus. Now, I, for one would be happy because I love buses. But what if you wanted to do something else?

Let us assume that I want to catch up on my Television viewing instead. Now I’m a fan of Mash, Knightrider and Scooby Doo, and I hypothetically imagine that Comedy Central, Star World and Cartoon Network are playing the three of them respectively. So, I decide to record the episodes in the morning while I catch up on my sleep. I wake up, refreshed, and head to work. I finish my days work, and head back to Backbay Depot, from where I board my AS1. I want to unwind, so I pull out my phone, and turn on the latest episode that I recorded earlier in the day. What if one morning, I decided not to sleep, I could watch Scooby Doo instead. Or maybe, I recorded an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Present the previous night and decide to catch up on some intriguing mystery before I get to work? Imagine, one day, there is less traffic, and I reach home before I can finish my episode. I get home, and finish viewing it on my large screen TV. Or what if there is crucial Football or Hockey match that is going on, and I need to watch it, but don’t have the time, or am at work? I simply hit record, and watch it in the comfort of my AS1, and maybe even my home; that too with the added benefit of pausing and rewinding whenever I want.

Overall, I think #TATASkyTransfer seems to be a good deal. Go for it, and if you take A8Express or A13Express, ditch those for an AS1 so you could spend more time watching the Telly.

 

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NMMT Limited: Will it succeed?

NMMT Limited; after my previous post on BEST, seems to be an interesting development. Note I am only calling it NMMT Limited; the word Limited is just a figment of my imagination.

 

Back in 2014, NMMT had a meeting with several IT service providers, including Trimax, ARS, and Atos to set up an Intelligent Transport System [ITS], which would have brought NMMT more or less along the lines of BEST. However, nothing of the sort has taken place so far. I still see NMMT issuing punched tickets, they have no Bus tracking mechanisms like BEST, and their buses are mostly rickety. However, a recent article in ToI stated that NMMT was in talks with App Developers to create an app to book an AC Bus ticket. A rather interesting development indeed.

In November 2014, ten months ago, NMMT was issuing punched tickets on its Volvo bus on Route AC-105. I was given 3 tickets of ₹20, one of ₹10 and one of ₹5 for a ticket worth ₹75. This was two months after I had got my BEST smart card. The situation was the same in April 2015.

A 5 rupee punched ticket issued by the Navi Mumbai Municipal Transport
A 5 rupee punched ticket issued by the Navi Mumbai Municipal Transport. Image copyright Srikanth Ramakrishnan, CC-BY-SA 4.0 International. Image available on the Wikimedia Commons.

Now, with punched tickets, and no Electronic Ticket Machines in sight, this could only mean that NMMT is manually handling accounts as well. With such a system in place, how do they expect to go straight to App based bookings? How will the conductor add it to his or her tally? Or will they treat the passengers similar to the way they treat a passholder for a limited route or distance? There are a lot of questions involved in this, so let us have a look at the possible problems that might occur.

 

Let us take an NMMT route with significant competition along it and examine what might happen:

Route: Borivili Station [East] – Thane Station [East] via Ghodbunder

There are four buses that run primarily on this route:

  • BEST 700Ltd: This is a non-AC service, with limited stops. [50 stops]
  • BEST AS700: This is an Air-Conditioned service with fewer services than 700Ltd. [44 stops]
  • TMT AC65: This an AC service with fewer stops than AS700. [18 stops]
  • NMMT AC121: This is an AC service with the same number of stops as AS700. [44 stops]

Now, given the competition along this corridor, we can say that just like the Bangalore-Chennai or Mumbai-Pune corridor, if one misses one bus, rest assured they will have another one, assuming they are not a Pass holder or a BEST prepaid card holder. For most people living in Borivili, being passholders, AS700 would be the ideal choice. For those living in Thane, AC65 would be the ideal choice. NMMT ideally would be catering to commuters between Borivili and Airoli, or Thane and Airoli.

Now, NMMT is planning an app for its commuters to buy tickets. The purpose of the app can vary. It may be to allow cashless travel, or paperless travel like the Indian Railways UTS app for the Suburban Railway lines across Mumbai and Chennai. However, if this was the case, then why is NMMT still issuing punched tickets? Another purpose of the App can be to reserve a seat, similar to CityFlo or rBus. However, my question is, if NMMT is still on punched tickets, this will lead to a big mess. For example: What if all the seats in the bus are full, and a commuter waiting for the bus has reserved a seat using the app, and walks into the bus to see there are no seats free? The app-user cannot be denied a seat since they paid for it, and the conductor cannot ask a seated passenger to get up. Similarly, if the app is indeed for paperless ticketing like the Railway app, how does it help in curbing frauds? The UTS app currently works in two ways:

  1. One is the GPS method, which works on select routes, mostly the Western and Central lines wherein you have to be either inside the station premises or within a certain radius of the station in order for the app to work. The ticket doesn’t need to be printed and showing the app screen is enough if a TTE comes along.
  2. The second method is the Printed Ticket method. This works on non GPS enabled routes, where after a ticket is bought, it needs to be printed. A reference number is given, which can then be entered into an Automatic Ticket Vending Machine [ATVM] at the Origin Station. The ticket cannot be printed anywhere else to prevent frauds.

How does NMMT plan to do this? The first method would be problematic since not all buses are equipped with GPS, unlike their purple counterparts with the BEST. The second method would be cumbersome for the conductor to punch in a number into their machine, if they have one, to log it. Since, they use punched tickets, the conductor would have to note down the number on a sheet to submit to the depot manager.

All this leaves a lot to wonder. Is NMMT equipped to handle all this? Can they outdo BEST at BEST’s own game?

Only time will tell us.

 

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