Thiruvananthapuram: With over 600 KSRTC buses plying through Thampanoor on a daily basis and more than 500 buses stopping at the the Central Bus Station, the traffic congestion in the depot is leading to delay in operation of schedules, especially for superclass services.To ease the congestion inside the Central terminal, the depot officials have decided to shift some ordinary buses to the parking bays in front of the terminal.As per the plan, the buses from Neyyattinkara, Parassala and Pappanamcode depots of KSRTC will be shifted to the bus bay in the front of the terminal building.At present, these buses stop in the separate bus shelter at the entrance of the bus station, near the old Indian Coffee House building. More than 400 ordinary bus services to Neyyattinkara, Vizhinjam and Poovar unit start the service from here.Interestingly, these were among the ordinary buses shifted inside the terminal compound due to traffic block in Thampanoor, two years ago. And since there was no space available in the 26 bus bays of the terminal, a separate bus shelter with three bus bays was constructed at the entrance of the bus station. These bus bays facing the main entrance will now be used for services from Neyyattinkara, Parassala and Pappanamcode depots. There is a roofed waiting area here and hence there would not be any inconvenience for passengers.Following complaints from operation staff on delay in schedules due to unavailability of vacant bus bays and traffic blocks, senior officials of the depot decided to rearrange the bus routes.“A superclass service bus needs to reach the bus bay at least 15 minutes before the schedule begins. There will be passengers who have reserved the service online and it takes some time to load the luggage on the bus. More often than not there are no vacant bays to park the bus, leading to a delay in schedule. Hence, it is planned to shift some of the ordinary buses to the bus bays in front of the terminal. A 15-day trial run will be conducted to check the viability,” said C P Prasad, DTO, Thampanoor.There are three bus bays in the front side of the terminal building, in which two bus bays are being utilised to park 20-odd buses to Nagercoil and Thenkasi. It is proposed to shift all buses to Nagercoil and Thenkasi to one bay and use the second bay for buses to Neyyattinkara.The officials also added that it was not a permanent solution to congestion, as the terminal did not have space to accommodate all the buses passing through or have stoppage at Thampanoor.Meanwhile, ordinary buses to Attingal are still parked near RMS office in Thampanoor.

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