Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Scheduling Schadenfreude

Anyone living in Bangalore knows that the traffic can be a pain and turn even the shortest of journeys into an expedition...  and while we are excited about the arrival of a brand spanking new international airport to the city, the travel time to reach it has caused much concern.  It's in the north, outside the city, about 40km from us - but that's about 2.5 hours driving time, depending on the time of day.  And while road improvements are being undertaken, there are still certain areas prone to jams.  The existing airport, while old and small, is just 10 minutes away from us in the south of the city.  And we are not alone in wanting the existing airport to stay open for domestic flights at least.  The new airport travel time could turn a quick 3 hour door to door trip to Goa into a 6 hour nightmare.  So, the front page of the newspapers was a welcome relief this morning, delivering the news that, surprise surprise, the new airport, due to open on March 28th, will now be delayed for two to four weeks due to the air traffic control system not yet being operational and approved.  Rather selfishly, as I have a big trip planned shortly, I can only pray that the system doesn't get approved until I am safely landed back in Bangalore, meaning that instead of leaving the house at 2am I can leave at about 5am for my flight... and have a 10 minute journey home at the end of that long haul flight back.