To solve Bengaluru’s infamous traffic problem, TOI recognized the power of locals and crowdsourced the solutions to Bengalureans, who knew the city in and out.

For this, TOI created a user-generated map hosted on a mobile responsive website, where people could directly report traffic issues using a data-driven approach:

• Real-time inputs on maps – users reported and flagged issues, using color-coded markers (Red for flagged, Amber for in progress, Green for resolved) for easy tracking.

• Consumer queries on Twitter – TOI forwarded flagged queries to Bengaluru Traffic police pressuring them to act, followed by media stories if no

Situation

Once famous as the ‘garden city’, Bengaluru (aka Bangalore) is now notorious for its terrible traffic. It is the baseline against which all other traffic in India is compared.

Infrastructural solutions by the municipal authorities and the state government (flyovers, metro rail) have not kept pace with Bengaluru’s traffic congestion. Many brands have created campaigns around it, comics have written jokes about it, memes and songs abound. But for the world’s second most congested city (Source: TomTom Traffic Index 2022), real change isn’t felt on the ground.

Brief

The Times of India (TOI), India’s largest circulated English daily, had written about Bengaluru’s traffic plenty of times. But this time, just writing was not enough.

The brief was simple:

• Don’t just do a good-looking ad campaign.

• Don’t talk big picture.

• Solve the traffic problem for the people of Bengaluru.

Objective

Real, immediate, measurable impact felt by commuters.

Bengaluru’s temperate weather and lovely forestation made it a retirement abode. However, India’s burgeoning IT landscape found a base in the “Garden City”, after which there was no looking back. People flocked in from all over, and by 2022, the city and the state of Karnataka together employed 4 million people in the IT industry (Source: The Hindu newspaper).

Unfortunately, the city’s infrastructure never grew with pace. Not only are the small roads not wide enough for heavy traffic, additional construction has also largely been unplanned and is often delayed. Whatever empty areas are left are often occupied by hawkers and vendors. The bad condition of roads and poor traffic management all come together to create the perfect storm for terrible traffic in the city.

But Bengaluru also has an active volunteering culture, where people come together for initiatives. And what better one than to improve Bengaluru’s traffic?

Decoding that there is no big fix or magical solution for the big traffic problem of Bengaluru, TOI kept two criteria in developing its creative idea – one that actually makes a difference.

• Involve the commuters – Do not limit efforts to just the government and municipal bodies. Include those most affected by the campaign – the commuters. The commuters face these issues daily and the best answers can be found with them, but nobody asks them.

• Go small to solve big – Not every traffic problem needs a flyover or underpass. Multiple local-level fixes, if executed systematically and in large enough numbers, can be very effective in unchoking regular traffic snarls.

The big idea – Unjam Bengaluru

TOI created ‘Unjam Bengaluru’, a campaign that invited citizens to play their part in solving their beloved city’s infamous traffic problem, one chokepoint at a time.

Primary target audience – Bengalureans

The well-informed, progressive, tech-savvy, and city-proud residents of Bengaluru.

They flit between the realms of print and digital. They hold a global perspective, yet their hearts are firmly rooted in the pulse of Bengaluru. They want a change that reflects their evolving worlds.

Secondary target audience – Traffic Police

Just including the commuters would mean highlighting problems. To solve these, TOI engaged with the city’s traffic police.

Approach

TOI used its connection to both readers and authorities to bridge conversations. A micro-level approach was adopted to decongest the city one chokepoint at a time. The strategy was to make small changes that would then snowball into a large impact.

This involved:

1. A commuter flagging an issue.

2. TOI escalating to Bengaluru’s traffic police, while also drawing attention to the issue.

3. TOI following up on a resolution and then flagging the issue as resolved.

For such a dynamic topic such as traffic issues, TOI created twin paths to real-time approaches.

1. Consumer queries flagged on Twitter – Whenever a person tagged TOI Bengaluru or used the campaign hashtag, TOI would forward these to the Bengaluru Traffic Police, building pressure to act. In the subsequent days, deeper media stories would be done to highlight the issue in case action had not been taken.

2. Real-time inputs on map – If a new issue was flagged, the subsequent user facing the same issue would see the issue flagged and just do a +1 on it. This avoided the hassle of adding issues every time. The simple colour coding made it easy to use – Red for flagged issues; Amber for in progress; and Green for resolved (closing the loop).

This resulted in 8,000+ suggestions and a campaign engagement rate of 24%.

‘Unjam Bengaluru’ generated 8,000+ suggestions from residents, of which 100+ were acted on by authorities. As the campaign gained momentum, it was organically picked up by the authorities, who later acted on 25 suggestions before TOI could even report them.

The campaign also resulted in an approximate 10% growth in average circulation, 2X our already ambitious target – proving our strong engagement with readers translated into them seeing TOI as the newspaper of Bengaluru!

We also performed well on our marketing objective, garnering 72% Awareness among TOI readers and a remarkable 57% Awareness among non-TOI readers.

Supplementary results that showcase the success of the campaign include:

• Reach – 18.5M

• Total Engagement – 7.3 M

• Engagement Rate – 24%

The success was so overwhelming that TOI extended its eight-week campaign for more suggestions pour in. TOI even published 25 impact stories to highlight these changes, encouraging further inputs.