[paragsachania]

Originally Posted by knightowl

I believe I should reach Bangalore comfortably by around 12 noon.

Knightowl, if it is 12 noon, I really don't see a reason why you should be avoiding the combination of NICE and ORR.

Whenever I am in the office in EC, I leave around 14:00 and always take NICE road till PESIT and then drive on ORR till Tumkur road (or full NICE road).

Trust me, at this time of the day, it is really the most sensible option and I can assure you that you will reach Hebbal in one hour or at max 70 minutes. From here you will reach Devanahalli in the next 30 minutes.

I say this because I always leave at 14:00 and still manage to reach my daughter's school by 15:05/15:10 near Hebbal, all this with a combination of NICE and ORR. Traffic is predictable and I have never got late (touchwood) despite of the white-topping work here on ORR that slows you down by 5-10 minutes.

However, for you, I would recommend taking NICE all the way till Tumkur Road (Madavara) and then you get onto NBTL to reach Goreguntepalya Junction. At noon, this junction on a weekday is easy to cross and after this its a free left onto ORR towards Hebbal. Post Hebbal, its the fast elevated road towards Airport anyway!

Honestly, you should not really worry too much and simply take the most easiest road at this time of the day to reach Hyderabad highway.

[Chetan_Rao]

Originally Posted by knightowl

.....
I did look at taking the NICE road and then linking up with NH 44 at Hebbal, but assumed Madavara-Yeswantpur may be very crowded; same issue with ORR on the east via Marahathahalli....

If you take the NECE PESIT exit and continue on ORR, you could bypass the whole Yeswantpur stretch by taking a left before you hit Tumkur Road signal, coming out on the highway to take a U-turn at Peenya Metro Station, get onto HMT road and come out via BEL Road way ahead of the usual bottlenecks and join NH44 at Hebbal junction (maps screenshot below, suggested route in green). Ignore the time/distance marker, wrong start/end coordinates.

I do that on every airport commute.

[paragsachania]

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

get onto HMT road and come out via BEL Road way ahead of the usual bottlenecks and join NH44 at Hebbal junction (maps screenshot below, suggested route in green).

He may not even need to do that. Instead, he can turn right after Kadambas and then the first left to join directly at the mouth of the underpass on ORR so he can take the next one too (underpass) and come out directly at Lotegolahalli.

But you need not do that (U-Turn at Peenya Metro) at all and still take the ORR itself. Even as a regular, I take that U-Turn and then the Watch Factory road only if I am passing this past 18:00 Hours to beat the crawl on ORR as you descend the ROB.

At noon, I will still prefer the straightforward and predictable ORR all the way.

PS: The bottleneck you referring in the image is reflecting your post at this time of the day. The situation is similar in the morning till 11am .

[Chetan_Rao]

Originally Posted by paragsachania

....
PS: The bottleneck you referring in the image is reflecting your post at this time of the day. The situation is similar in the morning till 11am .

My worst fear taking the regular route is that single lane flyover over the railway line. Completely unpredictable, needs just one vehicle to give up the ghost to gridlock the whole stretch, as happened a couple weeks(?) ago and they shut down the whole stretch from BEL Circle till Tumkur Rd. junction for several hours to reroute traffic.

[paragsachania]

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

My worst fear taking the regular route is that single lane flyover over the railway line

And I have been lucky that way that too when I am picking up my kid from School from 50 Kms away from EC via NICE and ORR!

The worst here is in morning and evenings. There is absolutely no doubt about that. However weekends get even worse.

[knightowl]

Dear all - Binand, Deehunk, Rajeevraj, Airguitar, Paragsachania, Chetan Rao, Thank you so much for your input. Your advices came very useful for the trip.

TL;DR at the bottom

It started off in an interesting fashion - Not wanting to disturb my five year old's normal morning schedule, we had planned for a relaxed start like any other school day. So I had put the fuelling up and the air-checking for the morning of the start. It was all fine till the spare was being filled when the tubeless tyre nozzle shot off as soon as it was filled - so made a trip to the puncture shop and got it replaced. The chap there noticed the bulge in the sidewall and advised to get the tyre changed at the next opportunity.

We ended up starting around 9.30 due to the delay. Around eleven, we had crossed Salem and were merrily on our way towards Dharmapuri, when the left front tyre burst (I mean it - burst as in around 1/3 of the sidewall had developed a crack). We stopped and put the spare on.

And promptly turned back to Salem to get the tyres replaced - didnt want to travel 800 kms and back on a suspect tyre with no spare. At the tyre shop, being curious as to why the burst had happened, seeing it had been put 'new' just before I purchased it secondhand last year, we checked and found that they were manufactured in 2015! I should have checked it properly at the time of purchase.

So by the time we restarted from Salem, it was after 12.30 and by the time we reached Bangalore it was around 4 pm. Now I was in a dilemma as to which route to follow. Checked Google maps and decided to take the NICE ring road to PESIT exit. Did that. And seeing that there was quite an amount of traffic at GGpalya, took the HMT main road and got back on the ORR at the BEL circle as advised.

Stayed overnight at 'Shivas Galaxy Hotel Airport road' just short of Devanahalli. Slightly over priced seeing it is in the outskirts, but the place was an excellent choice - the parking, rooms, view, bathroom, breakfast, cleanliness.

We reached Hyd the next day after a leisurely drive - had lunch at Amazon Kitchen - again thanks to all you folks at teambhp - lovely suggestion.

On the return drive, we had a small mishap after Kurnool when a swift dezire, after overtaking a tractor, indicated left and moved to the left lane, and then without warning moved back to the overtaking lane while I was already alongside overtaking him/her, and ended up banging on to left side of my car - leading to broken side-view mirror, transfer of paint and some dents onto the doors. I saw him going to the shoulder of the road and stopping. All of us were unharmed (we belt up always - including my daughter on her booster seat - her immediate response to the incident was 'why did he come back to our lane? that is not safe!') and the car seemed mechanically sound. I was caught in a dilemma - should I stop or continue? I was reasonably sure that the occupants of that other car would be alright, albeit shaken a bit - it would be just the body damage. I felt that stopping to censure him/her about the hazardous driving and trying to get them to pay would just delay and sour the rest of the trip. Hence I continued. Stopped at a petrol bunk half an hour later to assess damage.

We reached Devanahalli around 5.30 pm after a 8.30 start and saw a board saying Salem 320 kms. After a short discussion we decided to go for it and get home to Erode.

We bypassed Bangalore going via Hoskote, Chikka thirupathi, Hosur, and reached A2B BP COCO bunk after Shoolagiri around 8.00 pm, and took a very relaxed break, started around 10 pm, reaching home at Erode around 12.30 am.

Notes:
Lovely roads, all through out - easy drive.
Interesting pink coloured road around Gooty area - why?
The speed breakers along that stretch were more car breakers than speed breakers
We were surprised to see such vast tracts of land barren and unused.
The Korean signboards were interesting. Funnily, the mrs who is teaching herself chinese for fun, could make out some of the characters on the boards.
There were plenty of Emission check - PUC vans along side the road as we approached Hyderabad. The idea of sticking the sticker on the windshield side of the rearview mirror was a good one.
We stayed at Marriot Convention Centre at Hyd - it was a good stay with excellent service, the swimming pool could have been bigger with a kids pool.
The PV Narasimha Rao expressway is a life saver - we could get out of the city very comfortably in much less than an hour (from the hotel to the ORR)

Once again, thank you folks for the wonderful input. (Moderators, please move this post to an appropriate place if this is too long for a route query forum)

TL; DR:
Went via NICE-PESIT exit, HMT main road, BEL circle (4.00 pm to 6.00 pm)
Returned via Devanahalli, Hoskote, Chikkathirupathi, Hosur (5.30 pm - 7.30 pm)
Both were comfortable drives - good roads, tolerable traffic.

[tortoise]

Plan to drive to Kolar through Chikkathirupathy, Malur. Has anyone used this road recently? How good or bad is it?

[ampere]

Originally Posted by tortoise

Plan to drive to Kolar through Chikkathirupathy, Malur. Has anyone used this road recently? How good or bad is it?

Pretty decent. You should not see any issue. Some rough patches here and there but and large its OK. Some sectiuons around Bagalur-Malur have been fixed.

But I assume since you plan to drive from Chikkatirupathy, you may take short-cut and bypass Sarjapur/Bagalur totally. (link)

[Makin Rulesz]

What is the current status of roads on Hoskote - Doddaballapura - Dabaspete? Is the road widening work complete? I see on maps the highway number is changed from 207 to 648.

[paragsachania]

Originally Posted by Makin Rulesz

What is the current status of roads on Hoskote - Doddaballapura - Dabaspete? Is the road widening work complete? I see on maps the highway number is changed from 207 to 648.

I returned via Dabaspete Doddaballapura route last week when driving back from Gujarat.

Overall, the conditions between Dabaspete and Doddaballapura have improved a lot not due to expansion work but mainly because many sections have got patched up fully and it gives a pleasant ride all the way. The same route in March was good but still had rough patches.

On 4 lane expansion work, I noticed that nothing has changed and a lot remains to be done. It simply means it will take quite a few years to fully convert into 4 lane.

[gajadonga]

Traveled 2 weeks back
Devanahalli to Hosur via Chikka Tirupathi.

Devanahalli to Hoskote.

Roads are in good condition.

Hoskote to Chikkatirupathi.

All the road works are complete occasional pot holes but manageble.

Chikkatirupathi- Alambadi gate - Bagalur

Road work is going on some stretches are devoid road and is all gravel.
Driving in the night is difficult in this stretch.

Bagalur - Hosur.

Good condition

[deehunk]

The state government has turned its axe on the green filled Magadi-Huliyurdurga road. I was disturbed by the destruction of greenery on H Durga road, cutting of trees on Magadi road will start this week. This was the last stretch of green roads around Bangalore.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by deehunk

The state government has turned its axe on the green filled Magadi-Huliyurdurga road. I was disturbed by the destruction of greenery on H Durga road, cutting of trees on Magadi road will start this week. This was the last stretch of green roads around Bangalore.

Sad to see this. Remember driving around this area many years back. One of those classic 2-lane roads with trees around.

[paragsachania]

Update on Dabaspete - Doddaballapura roadwork and progress:

Have mostly been taking Dabaspete - Doddaballapura Road to reach Yelahanka each time I am driving from Tumkur side. However, it was done during the night not giving much hints about the actual progress of this expansion work.

I drove on this stretch last Sunday but under natural light and here is the dashcam clip of the entire stretch in timelapse:

https://youtu.be/6QZqDNl5RaI

• It is evident that there is a lot of work that needs to be done, at many places
• There is no sign of any recent work taking place here indicating that expansion work is in pause mode or completely stopped too
• On a positive note, the actual stretch has been patched up and at many section completely reasphalted with a fresh layer of tarmac that makes the drive very pleasant end to end

I am happy to pick this any day, especially during weekend returns because it helps me bypass a lot of congested sections on the regular highway. Further, Doddaballapura to Yelahanka is a fantastic and fast dual carriageway tolled road too.

[hydtraveller]

Hi Anurag, please let me know which route you finally took to by pass Bangalore during your Hyderabad Mangalore trip? Have an upcoming trip to Mysore and would like to avoid entering Bangalore city.
How ware the roads and traffic conditions?