Some pictures of buses in Chennai

As a transport enthusiast, I keep shooting pictures of buses, trains, trams and metros everywhere. Here's a selection taken with a Nokia 3500c in Chennai.

Chennai traveller infomation: How to buy travel passes for MTC buses
I had recently put together a brief presentation on this subject, and here it is.

Small stories about people and places

New media can tell many micro stories easily. Anyone with an interest in his surroundings and a small camera phone in hand knows that. Unlike the high power, bloated presence of television, the keen video blogger can achieve a lot more.

Here is the first of a series of videos that tell those small stories about life in India. These stories will be about small and big men. Many of these themes are too familiar to excite Indians. When put in context, they say a lot for a global audience.

This is the scene of Chennaiites returning home under trying circumstances. Pocket-picking gangs proliferate in these packed situations. Hopes are lost, as are fortunes. Governments don't care much.

These people must just pay their taxes and hope that somehow their lot will be transformed one fine day...

Travelling Wise, in Chennai

Information, they say, is power. It is also money. If you have to travel in Chennai without catastrophic expenditure, you must have the best tips on low cost mobility.

One of those is the "Travel As You Please" passes offered by the Metropolitan Transport Corporation, commonly referred to as the MTC.

I have put together a presentation on Google's new online presentation utility, on this. Actually, this kind of travel information should be publicised by the MTC proactively. Because they will not do it (although the National Urban Transport Policy of the UPA Government expects them to do so), I have done my bit.

With some time and effort, it can be expanded and hopefully will help many passengers travel wise. At present, I am only discussing the passes. I will add other aspects in future...

MTC responds to RTI Act petition

The usually recalcitrant Metropolitan Transport Organisation of Chennai, the monopoly bus operator has responded to a petition under the Right to Information Act, 2005 (RTI Act) seeking information on its Travel As You Please passes.

Chennairoads believes that one of the simplest solutions to improved commuting and tourist movement in Chennai is to popularise travel cards. These cards should be sold the way SIM cards, recharges and and top ups are being done, for mobile telephones.

That might be a tall ask as of now, because of MTC's 'sarkari' bent of mind. The Corporation exists to provide employment to several thousand people, not for the mobility needs of a six million population, it would appear.

Anyway, here is the link to the information provided by MTC.

Expect Ford to step on the gas in India

Ford, the iconic American car company that symbolised consumer utopia by mass manufacturing vehicles for the common man early in the 20th century has hit another massive speed breaker with a fourth quarter loss of 5.8 billion dollars and an annual loss of 12.7 billion dollars for 2006 (reports Reuters).

This is, according to the agency, the worst year in the 103-year history of the company. Last year, heavy job cuts sounded the alarm that Ford is running out of fuel (as the auto industry generally is bound to be in the developed world).

The question that should interest us Indians is the response from loss-ridden international automakers to the emerging scenario of global warming, costlier fuel and supply lines that are linked to the vagaries of geopolitics and the general unsustainability of motorisation in the developing world, of which China and India are the prime examples.

It is fairly certain that the losing carmakers will compete more aggressively in the developing markets; price cuts, cheaper (and unsafe) models, petrol/diesel guzzlers, higher emission engines and a tacit campaign against public transport are all being witnessed even today; we will see more of it.

The positive feature is that the frenzy of car sales has a GLOBAL climate impact, which is likely to send more Katrinas hammering the US coastline, as much as the typhoons in South East Asia and the seemingly unending monsoon downpour in Mumbai, all of these being very lethal weather phenomena.

If Indians are concerned about the future of the planet, and, that of their children, they should persuade the Manmohan-Chidambaram-Ahluwalia caucus against encouraging fuel-guzzlers from hitting Indian roads, whether they are from loss-ridden Ford, Chevrolet, Skoda, Hyundai, Suzuki, Toyota, Mercedes, Tata...

We need cheaper, modern buses that are rolled out on Indian roads by the tens of thousands each month. Why, if cars can be imported and sold (to supplement domestic manufacture), why not buses? And trains? and trams?

If the automakers are going to try to press the pedal further, we may have nowhere to run for cover.

Let us remember what Andre Gorz said long ago. It is simply impossible for everyone to want to buy a part of the beach, because that would give each person a few inches of beachfront; that cannot be used by the owner in any practical way. Ditto for the car. If all of us had a car each, none of us would be able to use them!