What Hinjewadi IT Park employees are doing to solve traffic problem?

Hinjewadi IT Park in Pune is now known for notorious traffic jams on weekdays. Hundreds of thousands of employees (including me) work there. Many vent their frustrations via social media.

The traffic at Hinjewadi is seriously frustrating & hampers productivity at work significantly. Come together. Tweet with #HinjewadiMess.
— Rahul Wane (@rahulwane) February 26, 2015

Road to hinjewadi - IT Capital of Maharashtra.. Place for major IT companies but full of traffic & potholes @Dev_Fadnavis pls do something
— iNikhil (@nikhilsarode123) March 3, 2015

So what are we doing to solve the traffic problem. Is there anything more than can be done?
First of I would like to quickly mention what is being already done to solve the issues.

Public Transport

You will surprised to know many employees regularly use PMPML buses even though they own cars.

Company Provides Buses

Thousands of employees (probably up to 40 %) use company provides buses instead of cars. We should also appreciate company administration managing bus services (in spite of many challenges).

Car Pooling

Many employees have taken efforts to car pool to save cost and indirectly reduce no. of cars on the roads.
One employee even quite his job to create car pooling app: http://www.mebuddie.com/home/carpool
We also hope that Olacabs will come up with some new ideas to encourage car pooling.

Hinjewadi Industries Association

The association has got a very clear mandate from companies to work on issues faced by employees (traffic, safety etc.). Although they are bit slow (lack of resources) they have take efforts towards solving many problems. They also act as official interface with political leaders and representatives,

See their initiative MetroZip.

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/HIA.Pune

You need to contact you company Admin head for any suggestions/ideas for HIA to work on.

Improving Public Transport

There are so many activists and organisation working to improve PMPML and in general state of public transport in Pune. Following is partial list:

• Save Pune Traffic Movement : very active on practical initiatives and working with Pune traffic police
• MCCIA Janwani 
• Parisar (you can participate on very active and informative online forum PTTF
• PMPML Pravasi

What Next?

Political Action

Small changes are possible if we common people co-operate, help, suggest government administration. But big changes are possible only if we actively participate in politics and influence decisions and policies and more importantly how tax payer money is used.

One example of Political action is signature and awareness campaign arranged by Hinjewadi IT park employee Ashish Mishra.

@devendradesh join us today to get solution on #HinjewadiTraffic @adityakaole @sdpolke pic.twitter.com/LXh1f6bQPY
— AshishMishra (@aashish81us) February 28, 2015

A meet was arranged at Shivar Chowk, Pimple Saudagar. Lots of people working in Hinjewadi IT park stay in this area. We had a very good discussion and exchange of ideas and took few signatures of people supporting the campaign.

Flyover Design

Few months back newly built flyover on Solapur road, at Mega center and Sahyadri Hospital corner (see location in map below) was opened for public.


View Larger Map

Simple observation of the flyover design would create lots of doubts and questions in anyone's mind.

Most shocking observation is that vehicles cross paths on the top of flyover. Very strange and unsettling, because common sense tells that flyover should make it possible for vehicles to travel without having to stop (for signal or pedestrians crossings etc.) anywhere. In other words, flyover should help move the vehicle fast (this does not always reduce traffic congestion, but that is another topic for discussion).

Is this flyover design correct?

Note: Above picture stitched image created using 2 different photos taken from top of nearby building. An object was blocking the middle portion of flyover, so I had to remove it and re-create flyover using photo editing.

You can easily see in above picture that vehicles have to be very careful or else collision can easily occur on the flyover (area marked in red circle). Also vehicles must slow down and stop on the flyover to allow other vehicles to pass. As of now, there is NO traffic signal on the flyover. Are they (Pune Municipal Corporation) going to install one? I don't know. If they do that would some kind of world record "A flyover with traffic signal".

Some unanswered questions:
Q. If this flyover design safe? Is crossing on flyover a good idea? 
Q. If NOT, they who approved this design?
Q. Is it worth Crores of rupees (people's money) spent on building it? what benefits does it provide?
Q. If it is flawed design, wow can we avoid this in future.
Q. Would it be some kind of world record if traffic signal is installed on a flyover?

Any ideas?

Note: If you are civil engineering teacher/student, please feel free to use this post and photo for classroom discussion.

Update (26 Dec 2014): Here is news article about Pedestrian First's proposal to modify the flyover.

Marathi Poems

काही दिवसांपूर्वी संदीप खरे आणि सलील कुलकर्णी यांचा "आयुष्यावर बोलू काही" चा जुना कार्यक्रम टीवीवर बघितला. खूप छान कविता आणि गाणी आहेत. संदीप खरेच्या कविता कुणाला आवडत नाहीत. त्याच्या कवितांचे पुस्तक आहे माझ्याकडे.

म्हंटल आपणही करावा प्रयत्न कविता करण्याचा, मनातील भावना व्यक्त करण्याचा. काहीशी अपूर्ण अशी आणि थोडीशी बोल्ड अशी कविता साधार करतो :

 "कोणीतरी"  

कोणीतरी माझ्या डोळ्यात बघून हसावे, लाजावे
कोणीतरी माझ्या केसांतून हात फिरवावा, कुरवाळावे
कोणीतरी ठेवावा माझ्या हातांवर हात, ओठांवर ओठ
कोणीतरी म्हणावे "तू माझा मी फक्त तुझीच"
कोणीतरी, जिच्यासाठी मी जगावे, मरावे !

Everyone Just Walks

Private Companies For Public Transportation

News article :
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/transportation/shipping-/-transport/Urban-transport-goes-corporate-Spice-Jet-MD-to-run-bus-fleet-in-Delhi/articleshow/5793965.cms
He said that the company will strive to provide Delhiites clean buses
which arrive on time, better trained drivers and facilities like
automated fare collection systems and GPS tracking.

Announcing the project, Verma added: ‘‘ The funds available with the
government are limited and Public Private Partnership (PPP) is the way
forward. By bringing in private players, we will be able to augment
the city’s public transport.’’

The start of the corporatization scheme comes as a breather for the
city that has around 5,000 buses against the requirement of 11,000.
Sources said the cluster will have a total 573 buses running on 32
routes. Of these, half the fleet will comprise of DTC buses. For its
services, Star Bus will be paid a around Rs 85.77 crore for first year
(Rs 47.4 per bus per km). The revenue from ticket sales on the bus
will go into the government’s kitty.

The operator will bring in all low-floor CNG buses. Of all buses , 20%
could be airconditioned. The entire operation will be monitored by the
transport department to ensure that stringent quality standards are
maintained. The department plans to float tenders for the next 16
clusters from next month and is in the process of making the terms for
the tender more stringent so that it attracts more serious bidders.
Following are my thoughts about this MoU between Star Bus Pvt Limited  and Delhi Govt. 
Routes
I assume government traffic department will decide routes and frequency. Private operator will be paid fixed revenue per KM that covers his cost and profit margin. This guarantees profit for private operator (which is okay, public transportation is not anti-business).
Bus Ownership
I assume , that private operator will buy and own (100 %) new buses (all CNG, 20 % AC). 573 buses per clusters. Initially 16 clusters. Later 16 more clusters. I hope and it seems that there is not partial ownership of buses. Existing fleet is and will be owned by govt. and will be phased out. New buses are 100% owned and maintained by private player, to be inducted gradually over a period of time (as existing old fleet is moved out.
Maintenance
Maintenance is prone to corruption, stealing and other in-efficiencies. Private player will be responsible for maintenance of buses and will be efficient for the same reason why people keep their houses clean but not the public place.
Employees
Also private player will hire/fire/train employees. Private player is likely to take better care of employees
IT and Software Infrastructure
Govt. is typically not very good in Identifying correct IT applications and buying them. Private player will decide on relevant IT needs and can buy them without cumbersome tendering processes.
Performance Monitoring
Private player and its performance will be monitored by the traffic department. Some kind of service level agreement. Risk of contract abortion will disincentives private player from cutting corners.
Revenue For Traffic Department
Traffic department will get all revenue earned by tickets. Nothing is mentioned about advertising revenues. So all that traffic department has to do is ensure that they come up with schedule, route, trip frequency such that revenue is more than Rs. 47.4 per KM. They pay Rs. 47.4 to private operator and rest is profit. If profit is negative it  would be a subsidy for public transport.
Depot land
There is not mention of depots. I assume relevant govt. agency will rent depot land to private player.

This is a win-win situation. Public representatives and government has full control over routes/schedule and how much they want to invest in bus transportation. They anyway decide FSIs of different areas, so they can decide routes. Every thing that requires engineering, IT expertise, honest employees and fast decisions is done by private player. In fact this will even improve working conditions for employees, so I hope they do not oppose this. Things like health
benefits take too much time in govt., private player can just use industry standard procedures.

Now for places like Pune, where central government has already given money to buy new buses, it is bit too late. Schemes with Partial ownership of buses were proposed but seems to be complex. Perhaps it would have been better if central government had given subsidy, subject to involving private player (who will own and buy buses) and generating certain revenue (that indicate no. of people served). The subsidy could be used to give attractive fixed revenue per KM to
private player. But in future Delhi model could be copied. PMPML could continue to operate some routes, side by side. They have to just make sure that routes operated by private player and PMPML are not overlapping.

Important details are missing in the article, so my assumptions could be wrong. Anyone (journalist, student etc.)  interested obtaining details should contact public relations officers at DTC and Delhi traffic department and obtain copy of MoU mentioned in the news article.

http://dtc.nic.in/dt2.htm#d1  
http://www.delhi.gov.in/wps/wcm/connect/doit_transport/Transport/Home/General+Information/Directory

Good News For Delhi Citizens

दिल्लीमें रहनेवालों, आप के लिए एक बढीया खबर हैं. कुचीह दीनोह पहेले DMRC ने एक अच्छा काम किया है. DMRC के लोगोने उनका पूरा मेट्रो टाईमटेबल गूगलके (सौफ्टवेर की दुनिया में जानीमानी कंपनी)  साथ बाटा है.  गूगल ने DMRC का पूरा Taeemtebal लेकर उनके Google Map http://maps.google.com/ application के साथ जोड़ दिया है.

अगर आपके पास Internet की सुविधा है तो आप गूगल के सौफ्टवेर का इस्तमाल करके फायदा उठा सकते है. नीचे दीये हूए चित्रोसें आपको पता चलेगा की, ये सौफ्टवेर बहूत ही बडीया है. 

DMRC का पूरा नेटवर्क :

आप कोई भी स्ट्येशन को choose करके, उस का टाईमटेबल देखा सकते हैं.

आशा करते है की जादा से जादा लोग इसका फायदा उठायेंगे. आपसे दर्कवास्त की आप अपने विचार DMRC तक पहूँचाये.