Bangalored? Take a Train

Anyone in Bengaluru knows the two conversation-starters the weather and the traffic.

- Ajay Sukumaran

The first has held up impeccably through a heatwave that scorched much of the country. The latter hasn't disappointed either-Bengaluru's notorious traffic is getting back to its pre-pandemic levels.

Back in 2019, Bengaluru ranked as the most congested city globally in the Amsterdam-based TomTom Traffic Index. It fell to the tenth position in 2021, thanks to the pandemic, while Mumbai overtook it to reach No. 5 and Delhi was at No. 11. However, there was a difference: Mumbai has a dependable local rail network that ferried nearly eight million commuters every day in 2019 while six million rode the Delhi Metro daily that year. In contrast, Bengaluru's 6,500-odd city buses and its 56-km metroline put together transported about four million.

Public transport infrastructure has been Bengaluru's bane. Bengaluru was the first Indian city in India to launch low-floor Volvo buses in 2006, but overall bus ridership has declined in the past decade-from five million daily passengers in 2014-15 to three million in 2019-20. Meanwhile, the city currently has over 10 million registered vehicles.