The news - that BEST is thinking of shutting down its AC service in phased manner within 2 years – will not come as a surprise to anyone who has observed an empty AC bus plying the city’s streets. This, however, is a clear case of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

I agree that there are many problems such as non-working or leaking ACs and faulty engines. Twice, I have myself had the joy of traveling in a bus that took forever to get to the other side of the flyover. The punctuality of the service is nothing to write home about. But shutting down the service is no solution.

Here are a few points for improvement, from the perspective of a commuter:

11. The service timings should be revised after a careful study of traffic patterns as well as commuter behavior and the buses should ply from South Mumbai to suburbs and vice versa during these times. e.g.  if you check the BEST site, some of the AC buses, like AC2, don’t operate from suburbs to South Mumbai in the evenings. I wonder what logic BEST has applied for this, if any.

22. There is no reason to ply these buses on Worli-Bandra sea link. Take example of AC-70. After Kherwadi, it takes the sea link and misses out on commuters going to Mahim, Sitala Devi, City Light, Shivaji Park & Prabhadevi.

33. I doubt if any express service is needed on the AC route (e.g. AC 70)

44. Put up the bus number in neon signs at the front and back. The way things are now, commuters have to run to the front of the bus to squint at the number that is hand-written on the lower left side of the wind-shield. Sometimes they run after the bus only to realize that it isn’t the one that they want to take.

And while the BEST is at it, it can do something more to make sure that more people travel by bus:

11. Modify the roofs of all the East-facing bus stops so that they shelter people from the morning glare, unless the BEST wants its customers to go blind.

22. Revamp the seating arrangement at the bus-stops such that old people and children can sit there comfortably while waiting for the bus. There is no need to worry that if bus stops are made cozy, people will come to stay there.

33.  Put up sign-boards depicting the entire route for the buses that halt at the stop so that people can figure out which bus they need to take. It’s not often that you find good Samaritans around who will tell you exactly which bus goes to Haji Ali or Andheri.

If you look at the long stretch of the vehicles waiting at any signal during the rush hour, it becomes very clear that what this city needs is not more cars or cabs or rickshaws – it needs better means of mass transport. For those of us who aren’t fans of local trains, mega blocks and broken pantographs, there should be options that are safe, clean, reasonably fast, reliable and timely.  

I don’t think that’s a lot to ask for.