Any move to get people out of cars and into public transport ought to be congratulated, for all the stated reasons: less congestion, less pollution, cost savings, and so on. It is unfortunate, however, that it's the shareholders of the public transport companies, meaning SMRT, SBS Transit and, by extension, ComfortDelgro, which will ostensibly carry the can for these initiatives. This is because greater competition for routes among various transport operators, while downward pressure on fares and raised expectations for higher quality service will inevitably be borne by the transport operators themselves.

Clearly, solving transportation bottelnecks is not easy. Otherwise cities such as Bangkok and Manila would have found solutions long ago. Increasing taxi fares has already prompted commuters to switch to public transport to some extent, as can be seen by the queues of taxis (not commuters, as was the case in the past) in the CBD, and the long snarls of taxis now at the airport. Raising acquisition and operating costs of cars has undoubtedly helped Singapore, too, although you wouldn't know it heading down the AYE at 7:45 in the morning. The only way to tackle the public transport issue fully, in my view, is to take away from cars the one thing which prompts people to choose them over public transport in the first place: convenience.

Many years ago, when I hosted the morning drive-time program on 938LIVE (then called NewsRadio 93.8), we posed the talkback question: what will it take for you to take public transport? One caller rang to say he would take the bus or train to work in the morning if he could get a seat. I asked him in reply, what the likelihood of this was? He said, very slim. As a result, he said, he would unlikely ever take the bus or train.

Cars allow people to move freely (traffic jams permitting), without being beholden to specific routes, and at a time of their convenience, without being beholden to timetables. Prevent cars from travelling to certain areas or at certain times, or both, and public transport will be the natural alternative.

Clearly it'll be difficult to give everyone a seat on every bus and train, but here are a few suggestions we can take the incentive away from cars, without hitting shareholders in the three public transport companies:

1. Turn Orchard Road into a pedestrian mall. Take away the convenience of cars and people will have no choice but to go (and they will still go, once all the refurbishments under the government's regeneration program are complete) using public transport. Such as the MRT. Or a single two-directional electric bus service. Or something similar. Make it stretch from Scotts Road to Buyong Road, or even past the Meridien Hotel.

2. Make bus services free in some areas. A government subsidy to allow anyone travelling from the harbour end of Anson Road to the Fullerton Hotel to ride for free will undoubtedly remove the incentive to drive out for lunch. It worked wonders down Adelaide and St. George's Terrace in Perth. In my view it can work in Singapore.

3. More direct routes. To be frank, the whole idea of feeder buses that deliver people to the MRT is a waste of time. Meanwhile, take the 157 any time from Toa Payoh to Boon Lay and you soon realise how good a 90 minute nap on a bus can feel. Again - make the bus routes more convenient than cars.

4. Privacy booths. This is a long shot, but taking the train gives you a lot of time to do work without uninterruption. If only you could use your mobile phone without a dozen other people listening in. How about (glass) booths to allow you to get stuff done in private. They could be chargeable.

There's no shortage of ideas. But central to the theme has to be: penalise car usage, not the bus and train companies.

Mark Laudi

Labels: comfortdelgro, public transport, SBS Transit, smrt