Broken doors, crowded buses, infrequent service and lax monitoring by officials — is the MTC listening?
It may come as no shock to city residents that 17 persons died and 51 suffered injuries due to footboard travelling in 2012.
Commuters blame it on lack of supervision by authorities along bus routes.
After the death of four students who were travelling on the footboard of an MTC bus on Monday, the focus has shifted, once again, to safety during MTC commute.
Of MTC’s total fleet strength of 3,637 buses, only 1,874 have automatic doors. And in many of those, the doors do not function properly. A rough survey on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning showed buses on routes 21G, A51, 23C, 27H and 47D plying with doors open.
T.K. Pandian, a quality assurance expert in logistics, said two automatic doors are mandatory for deluxe buses. “If the doors are maintained properly, the number of footboard-related accidents can be reduced by half,” he said.
The maintenance of MTC buses is carried out on contract basis, an official said. “But it is not done properly and often, spare parts for broken doors are not available,” he said.
The police said they continue to crack down on footboard travel but the practice continues. And so does the blame game between commuters and MTC. Buses of the transport corporation have been involved in a total of 315 fatal and non-fatal accidents, so far, in 2012.
“Two or more buses plying on the same route arrive at a bus stop together and often try to overtake each other. Commuters rush to board the least-crowded vehicle and come in the way of oncoming vehicles. This can easily lead to accidents,” said S. Gunaseelan, a regular commuter on route 27D.
Such incidents can be avoided if MTC officials are present at important bus stops, say experts. “Some years ago, traffic managers would track buses, study routes and the time taken by drivers to reach destinations. A detailed report would then be submitted to the planning department after taking in commuters’ needs and concerns. MTC should revive the process,” an official said.
Commuters also blamed inaction on the part of ticket inspectors. “Earlier, MTC officials would monitor frequency and quality of service at bus stops. Now, checking inspectors are concerned about tickets alone. Officials should keep a tab on bus timings and discourage bunching (arrival of two or more buses on a route at the same time),” said K.S. Ragunath, a commuter on 21G bus route.
AYANAVARAM DEPOT is still staying a decade back, sleeping without
introducing new bus requests based on the IT coridor and Industrial Estates, even after several request by residents of AYANAVARAM. There are several peoples travelling to Vadapalani, Ashok Nagar & Guindy.
After several requests 48C was (2) buses were extended to GUINDY. Now again they have reduced it to (1).
Need buses from AYANAVARAM to Kelambakkam
AYANAVARAM to Guindy
AYANAVARAM to Poonamalle
It is a fact that a significant part of our population is youth, mainly school and college goers. Its not only college but we also see tremendous school and bus accidents. I would suggest a little different approach across the state.
Change School, College and Office Hours - 1 Hour early for school and college and hour late for offices.
Leave politics aside, color code bus pass for both school and college, only government schools and college students get free pass and private school and college students get at very very subsidized rates (call me however you all want, if the parents can afford to spend on capitation and everything else 1000INR / Year is ok).
Now during the first school college hour, make more buses chartered, exclusive for school and college.
During Second Hour make some deluxe buses exclusive for companies at premium(like Bangalore did when I was going to ITPL in 2003-2004).
This way you can offset costs /loss and provide safe journey.
When i was doing my college, i faced a huge problem traveling in MTC buses.
It starts with
1. The ticket conductor will not respect people who travels with a government concession student pass.
2. they will not stop the bus in the stop where there are many student standing for bus (i totally hate this, when i was going for a semester exam)
3. The frequency of bus is less for the route tambaram to thiruverkadu.
4. Bus will be always crowded and students have no options other that traveling in foot board.
5. There is no Inspectors to control this.
In my view there are two reson for overcrowding in MTC buses.one lack of number of buses,consider route no:M500 plying Tambaram and chengalputtu,there are more than 15-20 stopping between this route.Second main thing bues are not coming in correct interval,either they come all at one or not.more over the stretch between tambaram and chengalputtu contain many collegs,schools,industry etc.so MTC(white board)must be incresed.
MTC should include more buses and streamline the bus-timings to avoid crowed buses.In some routes there will be only one bus per hour,as a result,the bus will be packed with people till the foot board.Nobody is going to wait for 1 hour for the next bus.
I feel sorry for the conductors,they find very diffcult to move through the crowd.Even if the bus is empty ,there people who like to travel through foot boards.No matter how much the conductor or passenges in the bus ask them to get inside,they want to play the hero and jump out of the bus even before it comes to a stop
Please Email the Editor