Book your tickets now! Train journey between Bangalore and Chennai during weekends is no cake walk
What is houseful? In the eighties, it would have meant a placard outside a theatre of a hit movie, but these days it would indicate “travelling from Chennai to Bangalore on weekends”, to and fro.
Chennai and Bangalore are perhaps two of the the nearest state capitals in the country, not including the new re-organization of states. These are two mega cities and there is a sizeable, floating population that works in one city and has its home in the other.
So every weekend there is a rush to go home and meet loved ones, which means a real squeeze and overload on transport systems: be it trains, buses, or even flights
Says Vinod, of 34 years and working at Mindtree, an IT services company, “I am from Bangalore but since the last two years I am here in Chennai on posting. Every Friday night I board the Kaveri Express from Central Station and for the return journey take the Chennai Mail from Bangalore on Sundays.”
He adds, ” I book for every week two months in advance and plan ahead if there are any festivals falling on either Thursday or Monday, in which case I get to be with my folks for longer.”
He has been married for six years and does not want to miss out on his two kids growing up. His wife has a government job in Bangalore and that’s something too good to give a miss by bringing the entire family to another city.
Vinod is not an isolated case. Getting tickets reserved for a weekend journey feels like a “Tirupathi” rush. There are 9 trains between Chennai and Bangalore, but you won’t find an inch to squeeze yourself into.
The same story with the buses, which has premium pricing. A Volvo bus would give a ride for Rs.400 on any weekday, but on weekends the rate is more than double. Says a bus operator, “We run extra buses on weekends and that’s when we earn our major revenue.”
The distance between Chennai and Bangalore is 350 km and it takes 6 hours of travel time which is the same with the trains, save the Shatabdi, which runs faster.
Even the flight rates show an upswing during weekends, though there are not many takers as the Bangalore Airport at Devanahalli is 25 km away from the city center and reaching it takes over 90 minutes. Also, it is an option which only senior executives can afford on a weekly basis.
It’s no fun having your office at one city and home in the other. Weekend rushes only show the cohesiveness of our family system, but that’s a whole other story, isn’t it?
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