Big relief for Bengaluru techies: Metro’s Yellow Line brings cheer to IT professionals who were wrestling road traffic to Electronics City

BENGALURU: For the city's traffic-weary commuters, particularly those in the tech hubs, this was a Monday morning with a difference. There was a different kind of a rush, and the buzz in the air was unmistakable.No, for a change, the rush and the buzz were not on or about road traffic, but on the platforms. The platforms at stations on the newly inaugurated Yellow Line of Namma Metro, to be precise. From the moment the first train rolled out of RV Road Interchange, the excitement was quite palpable as commuters in this part of the city had a train to catch — junking, for once, the thought of having to negotiate a nightmare called rush-hour traffic.

When TOI visited RV Road (one of the terminal stations on Yellow Line) in the early hours, there were many commuters, with some capturing their first Yellow Line ride on their mobile phones. On the train, there were those hunting for a seat, perhaps to catch a quick nap on the 35-minute glide to Bommasandra (the last stop). By 8am, at Silk Board, the train had no vacant seats left. From RV Road, it was a seven-minute ride to BTM Layout, 11 minutes to Silk Board, 25 minutes to Electronics City, and 34 minutes to the terminal at Bommsandra.

Electronics City saw the highest footfall as hundreds of professionals swapped road chaos for a smooth, signal-free Metro ride. And it was not just commuters to Electronics City who were all smiles. The Yellow Line attracted even those living in the southern fringes of the city, who need to travel to Whitefield daily for work. With the fare capped at Rs 90 over 45 stations from Electronics City to Whitefield — with two changes — the Yellow Line is already proving to be a game changer.Fourth rake by next weekHowever, despite the obvious advantages of the Yellow Line, many passengers said the 25-minute wait for a train was a major dampener and hoped BMRCL would expedite induction of more rakes to shorten the wait time.At present, BMRCL is operating services on the Yellow Line with three rakes. A fourth is expected to arrive next week. A BMRCL official said: "Heavy rain along the Andhra-Karnataka border has delayed arrival of the rake."By March 2026, the Yellow Line is expected to have 15 trainsets running at a frequency of five minutes during peak hours and eight minutes during non-peak hours, BMRCL sources revealed.Need for platform doorsThe increased wait time for trains on Yellow Line had a ripple effect in terms of crowding at RV Road station. With the Green Line now operating at four to eight-minute intervals, passengers getting off those trains now must wait for nearly 20 minutes before they can get on to a Yellow Line train. No wonder Metro station staff had a tough time managing the crowd at R V Road. In view of this, Bangalore South MP Tejasvi Surya, who travelled on the Yellow Line on Monday, urged BMRCL to install platform screen-doors at R V Road as a safety measure.