New Airport trigers chain reaction

24Th may 2008 saw the new airport in Bangalore. I landed to HAL airport on 22Nd night, last day of its public life and the only airport tag it had for Bangalore since its inception for public carriers. Probably Bangalore has now 4 airports in total. When I arrived I could see the chaos at the airport thou the flight landed quite on time.

We were ferried by the normal city buses to the arrival lounge. One there could see the chaos at its peak. One of the Airline personnel was surrounded by lot of people for the delay in arrival of their baggage. " We have been waiting for 2 hrs for our baggage to arrive, at least tell us if we are going to get our baggage" said one, other person wan not that kind and said " you are testing my patience" quipped another " Where is your manager call him or give me his number" by this time the airline staff had enough and had to respond and said in moderately polite manner " Sir, I cannot give his no" , this had surely infuriated the crowd " I am sure you are not the chairman of the company , and you must surely have a senior " said another. Honestly I somehow expected this kind of chaos and hence enjoyed this conversation but thought to move in form this location to check the fate of my own luggage. Luckily I have only 10 minute drive from this airport to my home and my family was any way not in station hence I had all the time in earth to enjoy the last moment of this Airport, surely a little sad inside knowing that all my luxury will just end tonight.

I got my luggage in 1 hr time only and felt like a king that my experience had been better than others.As customary I thought I will take the prepaid taxi home but that could not happen as the counter was closed , so I could not avail this luxury for the last time, hence pushed the trolley slowly out letting every moment sink in as if there was no tomorrow.

Once out there were horde of auto, taxi guys started approaching me. Once approached by a old man I asked him how much he will charge me for my destination to then he responded Rs.200. I confronted that was way too high and I could easily get somebody for the fraction of that cost. This statement of mine did bring tears to his eyes; he said that he has been a airport taxi operator for about 33 years. This was his last day and probably last trip. He said that now he is too old to carry on his operation form the new airport. Being an emotional person I agreed and did put in my luggage in his cab and started moving out of the airport.

Our conversation continued “Sir there are lot of people like me here as old as me, it was like every thing for me, all my friends were here only". Visibly he was in more control of himself but I could still see the sombre mood he had. He was truthful and said that he could fulfil all his responsibility with this job and also introduced one of his sons in the same work. He was quite worried about his son and other young drivers who had been working for past 8 years in this same profession. His grouse was Government kept our hope alive till the last moment and duped thousands of people of their lively hood.

I am surely not against any new infrastructural development but just been noting few reactions which new airport has created starting from the unemployment mentioned above for the taxi and auto drivers. There had been hundred of ground handling staff of the airport has lost their job too. There must be a lot of other petty people who would have lost their livelihood.

Another major reaction was the Airport road itself. Traffic has been quite a lot light. If fact one of these days when I was coming home via this road late night it has a scary silence. All of a sudden I could see as if the place has been taken out from the centre to a outside the city. I am sure it will have some reaction the property prices too. I am happy as for me reaching to office is quite faster now and not to mention the ease.

Since the new airport has banned the entry of the autoric. There is a tremendous shortage of the cabs from and to the airport. According to a auto driver there were about 10K auto movement in the old airport. Hence there surely will be the acute shortage of cabs at the airport. I could realize the same once we needed to call the normal city taxi for a drop to Railway station. Not one but 3 - 4 what we called all denied having any taxi available with them; while probing further they confirmed the airport bookings.I am sure the dynamics are going to settle down in due course of time for now it is surely and rapidly getting settled.

Autonomics

I never thought that the level of economics could be involved in the Autoric of Bangalore and to top it the entrepreneurs of this business perfectly understand it and communicate it. It has been more than nine years in Bangalore and I had been an avid auto user since then. Of late all of us have been complaining that Auto drivers have gone crazy and bad. Yesterday I could crack with the help of an Auto driver; it is that they have been driven this way because of the tremendous economic change which Bangalore has gone thru. Let me put the economics point wise:

1. Time is money: We have all seen Auto guys cribbing about the traffic. Actually earlier when Bangalore traffic was manageable they were able to take more money home then they could do it now. They spend quite a lot of time actually spending on the traffic which is loss of revenue for them. Taking Inflation into picture which has gone up several times but the revenue is going southwards for them. This could be the possible reason of them going mad about the revenue stream and doing the corrective actions from their side.

2. Location and competition matters: If you are an auto user, I am sure you would have noticed that to certain part of city they will be any way asking for extra, and it could be true for most of the drivers. For other parts they will meekly agree and will go on meter. This is decided on two accounts 1. The Bus service: areas where the bus service is better or good they tend to respect the competition. It’s quite logical if bus service is good you need to surely take bus, if it’s fair consider seriously using them as often as possible. 2. Affluence: Certain parts of city people are more affluent and can pay more. Hence by default they try to more there to cross subsidise the loss on other counts.

3. Other: I am sure some of them are street smart and some are absolute cheats who try to gain more from their customer. There are some time windfall gains like Rains, Late night etc. etc. One of the other major factors that change the pricing structure is the timing like peak hours and off peak hours.

4. Competition and threats: The immediate threat is the new Bangalore airport. They say the autos will not be allowed to the new airport and firstly it will not be possible for the auto to travel that fast to that far. This is estimated as 40% reduction in their business. Second major threat is the Bangalore Metro; they say it would wipe off their business quite a lot. I tend to disagree here completely as I feel it would mean less traffic (hopefully) hence they should be more profitable and they will get small haul drop to and fro form metro stations. I also believe the shorter hauls are more profitable if it is within the minimum chargeable range.

5. Largest customer base for them is women. Hence in peak hours when autos are scarce they will prefer to give preference to this loyal customer base.

I could have not reached to the above conclusion if I have not met "Srinivas" the auto driver who drove me home last night. There were other lessons of life learned too " Sir Life is very simple , but you have to actually study it , understand it , then only it is possible for you to lead a happy life " he says this in good English . He adds “Sir, I do not have any property, my father was a wealthy person but lost everything to his bad habits of gambling and drinking, today I have a son and all I care for is giving him good education “. Probably he has studied his life carefully and drawn the line of happiness.

I hope this could guide you to know how to negotiate with the auto driver next time you hit the road for the same. I might be completely wrong but these are only my views based on my interaction with various auto drivers and observations, you are free to accept or scrap it.

Chain reaction of elections

It was the eve of elections in Bangalore. After office at 7:00 I decided to walk down to the M.G Road and further to the Brigade road and then take a Auto ric. to home. This is a kind of evening walk I enjoy and normally do when my driver is absent. Earlier I use to enjoy more as there would be less hustle bustle around on the contrary now a days there it is not so enjoyable, more over the majestic looks of M.G road has been temporarily destroyed because of the Metro rail coming up. I was expecting the same chaos when I started but to my astonishment I could see that it was quite a free street with quite fewer people around. I have a customary stop at the dead end of Brigade road , where I stop for my Chocolate softee. While there I could chat with the shop owner to find out about this calmness . He very sadly replied that " Today all the bars are closed, tomorrow is elections" . Well it takes the elections t close the bars some time and it takes closed bars to reduce the traffic on roads . For me surely it was the best Friday evening walk I ever had on that stretch.

The First Post

This is my first post here . I am going to write about the interesting noting I make around me, books I read, sites I browse and any thing that interests me. I am sorry I am not too good in writing but will try and do my best.