“Yelli Iddira?” is a service provided to commuters to track BMTC buses (only the famed VOLVO Service) using GPS data.
"Yelli Iddira?" - in Kannada means "Where are you?"
To just give you a brief history : BMTC (Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation) launched the Volvo bus service in Bangalore in January 2006 and ever since it has been very successful.
The chassis in the BMTC Volvo is that of B7RLE and is assembled at Volvo's factory in Bangalore. It has a seven-litre engine that meets Euro 3 emission regulations. The body is built on the same design as the Volvo 8700, which is currently used in Europe.The Volvo buses are sleek, red coaches, fully air-conditioned and compliant with Euro-III environment norms, other special features include kneeling mechanism for the benefit of the aged and the physically challenged; wide, pneumatically operated doors to enable easy boarding and disembarking of passengers.
I have personally travelled atleast 50 times and have enjoyed every single ride. The cost seems to be on the higher end - but I would agree with BMTC's argument that "All good things come at a price".
Now let me get back to how to use Yelli Iddira to find a Volvo:
Supposing you are at Silk Board, and wish to go to ITPL. The VOLVO bus route no V500L, connecting Banashankari Bus Station and ITPL, touches Silk Board at Hosur road Junction.
To know the current location of the buses along the route, send an SMS message to 99456 34666 reading ‘Yi V500L U’, where
- Yi stands for ‘Yelli Iddira?’,
- ‘V500L’ is the route number,
- ‘U’ stands for ‘up’ (buses heading out of the ’starting station’ are
And, within a minute, you will receive a reply stating, for example, “Jayanagar East End; Bellandur; Marathalli”, meaning there are three buses on this route currently, each of them approaching the stops listed, after having left the previous stops. The buses approaching Bellandur and Marathalli is of no use to you. So you can wait a few minutes for the bus from Jayanagar East End to come to Silk Board.
Isn't this truly cool.
