Pune: Bengaluru to Pune in 80 minutes. AreoMall to Baner 90 minutes!Baner’s Prasad Karwa experienced this on Monday evening. The digital marketer flew with his parents from Bengaluru to Pune — an aerial distance of around 741km — in about an hour and 20 minutes. The 18km cab ride from Pune airport to his Baner home took an hour and 30 minutes.“We boarded an Akasa Air flight from Bengaluru at 4.30pm, after an hour’s delay, and landed in Pune at 5.47pm. After collecting our luggage, we reached the AeroMall around 6.10pm and were in a cab by 6.20pm,” Karwa told TOI.He said the traffic was heavy on every road on his way home. The cab crawled for long stretches.“In Bengaluru too, there is a traffic problem, but the airport is far from the city. In Pune, the airport is practically within the city. Poor road conditions added to the congestion and made the journey more frustrating. We finally reached home around 7.50pm. Traffic in the city has clearly worsened,” he said.The airport commute has long been a concern for flyers. In 2017, a Hinjewadi-based techie got stuck in traffic after dropping a friend at Pune airport. While he was still caught in congestion, his friend called to say he had reached Dubai.Many frequent flyers have weaved substantial buffers into their travel time because of the erratic traffic. “I live in Kalyaninagar, about 4km from Lohegaon airport. Yet, for the past year, I have been leaving home at least three hours before my flight so that I have enough time to reach the airport. Poor roads and undisciplined driving have made matters worse,” said entrepreneur Anuja Ingle.Kondhwa’s Danish Shaikh frequently travels to Dubai, where a friend runs his business. “The SpiceJet flight is scheduled at 9pm, but I prefer reaching the airport much earlier to skirt the risk of getting stuck in traffic. Getting out of Kondhwa at times takes more than an hour. I have no idea what authorities are doing apart from making announcements,” he said.Sustainable mobility expert Pranjali Deshpande said the city’s approach to congestion needed a fundamental rethink. “The government appears focused on infrastructure for private vehicles, including tunnel roads, HCMTR, flyovers and bridges. The focus should instead be on public transport. If HCMTR is meant for public transport, there is no need to allocate lanes to private vehicles,” she said, adding that Pune needed to prioritise mass transit and create infrastructure that encouraged commuters to switch from private vehicles.
