[Alton]

Latest update on Route - May 2016

Hyderabad - Mumbai - Onward journey:

Vehicle : TUV300

Total Drive time : 14 hours with Food/Biobreaks in Solapur and Mumbai Expressway.

Start Time: 0500 hrs from Miyapur,Hyderabad ;
End Time: 1900 hrs,New Panvel,Mumbai.

Hyderabad - Solapur : 4 lane work under progress with a lot of diversions after Sangareddy.Heavy truck traffic and big speed breakers through villages.Bad road quality with deep troughs on the road.
No decent places for Food/Bio breaks.Congestion while passing through towns enroute.

Solapur-Pune : Excellent 4 lane Solapur Bypass highway. Preferred place for Food/Biobreaks is Vithal Kamat with clear signboards on both ways.One restuarant on each side both from Solapur and from Pune side is a plus.

Pune - Mumbai : Tiresome navigation through Pune city with added city traffic.After Pune city,excellent Mumbai-Pune Expressway with slow traffic in the ghat section.


Mumbai - Hyderabad Return Journey:

Vehicle : TUV300
Start Time: 0700 hrs, New Panvel Mumbai
End Time: 2130 hrs,Miyapur Hyderabad
Total Drive Time: 14.5 hrs.

Mumbai - Pune : Excellent Drive with slow traffic on the ghat section due to heavy truck trailers.

Pune - Solapur: Easy exit and good bypass through NH4 and Zoo park road - Pune Satara road and Shankar seth road till connecting to NH9 to Hyderabad.Excellent road till Solapur.

Solapur - Hyderabad: Heavy Truck traffic,poor roads with potholes on sharp turns.Lot of diversions due to 4 laning.No decent Food/Biobreak places. Hotel Gujarat after Omerga is OK on Food but very bad on Wash room maintenance.Very Heavy truck traffic after Humnabad to BHEL Hyderabad.

[whoztheman83]

Would you guys strongly recommend not driving at night from Hyd to Mum? Or is it doable with cautious driving? Planning to leave Ghatkesar at around 6:30 PM(right after Friday work) and hoping to reach Mumbai by around 10 AM in the morning assuming a very slow drive in the night(especially the Hyd-Solapur stretch). Last time i drove this stretch was 1.5 years back but not in the night. So those who have done this stretch, especially at night, is it a very risky drive or manageable?(driving an Alto).

[Drivethru]

Originally Posted by whoztheman83

Would you guys strongly recommend not driving at night from Hyd to Mum? Or is it doable with cautious driving? Planning to leave Ghatkesar at around 6:30 PM(right after Friday work) and hoping to reach Mumbai by around 10 AM in the morning assuming a very slow drive in the night(especially the Hyd-Solapur stretch). Last time i drove this stretch was 1.5 years back but not in the night. So those who have done this stretch, especially at night, is it a very risky drive or manageable?(driving an Alto).

Please drop the plan. Many stretches of road are under construction in the hyd-solapur section. If you have to leave at that time take a bus as a 630 pm from hyderabad outskirts will take you to bombay by 8 am unless there are some delays.

Incase you have to do this drive start at 4 am in hyd. Post solapur till bombay roads are good. If you still want to try this start at 630 pm please do it with a co driver and if required stopover in solapur in the night.

[whoztheman83]

Originally Posted by Drivethru

Please drop the plan. Many stretches of road are under construction in the hyd-solapur section. If you have to leave at that time take a bus as a 630 pm from hyderabad outskirts will take you to bombay by 8 am unless there are some delays.

Incase you have to do this drive start at 4 am in hyd. Post solapur till bombay roads are good. If you still want to try this start at 630 pm please do it with a co driver and if required stopover in solapur in the night.

Thanks for the reply, i didn't go with the plan anyway :-) I left Ghatkesar at 5 in the morning and by the time i started on the bad stretch of roads after ORR, daylight had just begin to break. So it was perfect time to start although consumed two cans of red bull through out the day to keep me awake :-) Bad time to reach Panvel(around 6 30 PM) because of Metro work, rains, Ganpati preparations & bad roads in Mumbai.

In hindsight, you are absolutely correct, the roads outside Hyd city are terrible to drive on in the night. Even as dawn was breaking, the high beam from oncoming trucks and narrow roads made the ride extremely risky. Would avoid no matter what.

[Ravveendrra]

Originally Posted by Ravveendrra

I have done both up and down on the Karad - Islampur - Sangli - Miraj - Athani - Bijapur - Jevargi - Gulbarga - Sedam - Kodangal - Pargi - Chevella - Hyd route in the past few weeks as well as the Pune - Hadapsar - Solapur - Humnabad - Bidar - Zaheerabad - Hyd route last week.

I would definitely recommend the Bijapur - Gulbarga route. It is longer but the time taken is the same. NH9 is frustrating to say the least.

Cheers,

Nothing has changed since my post 2 years ago. If anything, NH9 between Hyd - Solapur is worse now. My time using the route I mentioned above when I drove in Jan and March was 11hrs from including b'fast, lunch and 3 tea breaks.

The writing is on the wall. If someone still wants to take the NH9, it is their choice.

Cheers,

[carlosTHEjackal]

Latest update on Route - 26 Dec 2016

Hyderabad - Solapur journey:

Vehicle : Skoda Rapid

Total Drive time : 6:00 hours with Food/Biobreaks in Sastapur / Basavakalyan.

Start Time: 1115 hrs from Exit 3,Hyderabad Nehru Outer Ring Road;
End Time: 1715 hrs, Solapur Byepass.

Hyderabad - Solapur : 4 lane work under progress with a lot of diversions after Sangareddy. No work in progress in MH section of the road. Major work in KA and TS sections with Heavy truck traffic and big speed breakers through villages. Very bad road quality with deep potholes on the road.
No decent places for Food/Bio breaks. Small congestion while passing through towns using diversions enroute.
Lot of 2 wheeler traffic in MH sections of the road. MHRTC buses do not give way for overtaking.

Hotel Gujarat near Basavakalyan is OK, but worse wash rooms. Zero maintenance.

Not advisable for night drives and can opt for alternate routes for good roads.

[whoztheman83]

Originally Posted by carlosTHEjackal

Latest update on Route - 26 Dec 2016

Hyderabad - Solapur journey:

Vehicle : Skoda Rapid

Total Drive time : 6:00 hours with Food/Biobreaks in Sastapur / Basavakalyan.

Start Time: 1115 hrs from Exit 3,Hyderabad Nehru Outer Ring Road;
End Time: 1715 hrs, Solapur Byepass.

Hyderabad - Solapur : 4 lane work under progress with a lot of diversions after Sangareddy. No work in progress in MH section of the road. Major work in KA and TS sections with Heavy truck traffic and big speed breakers through villages. Very bad road quality with deep potholes on the road.
No decent places for Food/Bio breaks. Small congestion while passing through towns using diversions enroute.
Lot of 2 wheeler traffic in MH sections of the road. MHRTC buses do not give way for overtaking.

Hotel Gujarat near Basavakalyan is OK, but worse wash rooms. Zero maintenance.

Not advisable for night drives and can opt for alternate routes for good roads.

Travelled to Mumbai and back last week. The route via pargi-Sedam-Gulbarga-Allankot is a far better route to take. This route sees less traffic and the roads are in better condition. Downside is that it is two lanes all the way till Solapur. Pretty manageable and less stressful compared to the Zaheerabad-Humnabad route.

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by whoztheman83

Travelled to Mumbai and back last week. The route via pargi-Sedam-Gulbarga-Allankot is a far better route to take. This route sees less traffic and the roads are in better condition. Downside is that it is two lanes all the way till Solapur. Pretty manageable and less stressful compared to the Zaheerabad-Humnabad route.

Could you please advise the condition of the KA-MH border road between Aland and Akkalkot.

[zen91]

Originally Posted by ranjitp1

Could you please advise the condition of the KA-MH border road between Aland and Akkalkot.

Traveled on 10th Dec'16 on this road and it was all done up. The non existent portion of the road is also made. In fact this stretch between Aland and Akkalkot is the best now, though the speed breakers will slow you down near villages.

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by zen91

Traveled on 10th Dec'16 on this road and it was all done up. The non existent portion of the road is also made. In fact this stretch between Aland and Akkalkot is the best now, though the speed breakers will slow you down near villages.

Thanks!that's great news.So in your opinion,Hyderabad-Sedam-Aland-Akkalkot-Solapur is all superb now?.

If that is the case,this must definitely be a better option than the NH9 to solapur till the time the 4 laning is complete.

[zen91]

Originally Posted by ranjitp1

Thanks!that's great news.So in your opinion,Hyderabad-Sedam-Aland-Akkalkot-Solapur is all superb now?.

If that is the case,this must definitely be a better option than the NH9 to solapur till the time the 4 laning is complete.

Please avoid NH9 completely for now.

Hyderabad- Sedam- Aland-Akkalkot-Solapur is the best option. On this section Ribbonpally to Akkalkot is very good now. 35-40 kms of Akkalkot-Solapur has rough patches/broken road and would slow you down,but good to do 55-60 kmph if traveling in a sedan/hatchback.

[ranjitp1]

Originally Posted by zen91

Please avoid NH9 completely for now.

Hyderabad- Sedam- Aland-Akkalkot-Solapur is the best option. On this section Ribbonpally to Akkalkot is very good now. 35-40 kms of Akkalkot-Solapur has rough patches/broken road and would slow you down,but good to do 55-60 kmph if traveling in a sedan/hatchback.

Last question I promiseHow long did ORR-Akkalkot take in terms of drive duration.

[zen91]

Originally Posted by ranjitp1

Last question I promiseHow long did ORR-Akkalkot take in terms of drive duration.

Sorry for the delayed response. It took roughly 5 1/2 hrs with a half an hour break for breakfast at Pargi.

[Rehaan]

Thanks to BeingHyderabadi on twitter for sharing this:

[Drivethru]

Drove to Mumbai and back over the weekend.

Update on NH9:

Omerga - Solapur stretch is very bad.

Many sections of new highway opened (between zaheerabad to omerga) while there are many under construction sections and diversions.

Avoid NH 9

Update on Solapur - Kalaburagi - Hyderabad section:

The bad stretches:

Google maps directed me through Solapur bypass road to exit the city and join akkalkot road. This bypass road is bad for about 12-13 kms.

Roads inside Akkalkot town are very bad for about 2-3 kms.

The roads in manneguda, parigi, chevella and moinabad towns were bad. Chevella was very bad with many potholes. These were all for 1-2 kms each.

Barring these stretches , the roads are in excellent condition in Karnataka and average once you cross over into Telangana. But way better than NH 9

Took me around 6 hrs from Solapur to ORR entry point.

Pune Solapur blissful road with lot of new food joints along the way.

Mumbai Pune expressway is in perfect condition. I try to check google maps for some massive jams before entering the expressway. Old Pune Mumbai road is an alternative if you see massive jams on the expressway on google maps.

I saw a 6 km jam on the Mumbai Pune section (car breakdown on narrow segment of the expressway) while going towards Mumbai.