Traffic report on radio stations

What is one common program across all FM radio stations in Bangalore? Something that they play tens of times every day? Something that the radio stations want you to believe you cannot live without? Something that claims to make your life easy every day? Something, in spite of all these claims, is roughly as useful as navel lint? It is none other than traffic congestion report, of course.

First of all, the methodology used to obtain traffic congestion information is the biggest culprit. I have seen traffic reports coming out of helicopters in the US. Here in Bangalore, radio jockeys ask the commuters to send out traffic jam information to them and they in turn broadcast it to the entire city. The concept is nice, but sadly it doesn't work. The people stuck in a traffic jam often have no clue about the cause of the jam. Often, they don't want to or cannot get out of their cars to find out. However, they cannot control the urge to send out an SMS. Hence you hear reports like "The outer ring road is blocked all the way from Sarakki to Mysore Road". Hey, that is around 7KMs of jam. How does any one person know that the jam is that big?

Secondly, the information is often incomplete. In the evenings I always get to hear this: "Huge traffic pile-up reported in Madivala". Alternatively how about this: "Slow moving traffic on Airport Road". Well, where on Airport Road? Eastbound or westbound? Which parts of Madivala? This information is meaningful only when it is qualified with more details, like "Huge traffic pile-up on Hosur road, heading towards Electronics city, at Bommanahalli junction".

Lastly, in most cases, there is very little you can do with the information, even though it is accurate. In most areas on the outskirts of Bangalore, which are hardly planned, there are no alternative roads. For example, if I hear in the morning that Bannerghatta Road is choked north-bound, I still get on to that road, because I have no credible alternative. This would be true for most roads heading out of the city and the outer ring road. The only use of this traffic information would be to mentally prepare in advance to suffer. That is not much of a use, is it?