Min Raymond Lim's Bus and MRT plans only partial solutions

robertteh SG

I look forward to a new enlightened leadership for LTA from Mr Raymond Lim.
Minister Raymond Lim as a minister can adopt a 3-tier traffic master plan for long-term free flow of traffic for citizens i.e. (1) Tier-1 Expressways for inter-estate fast traffic (2) Tier-2 Major roads linking the expressways to local roads (3) Tier-3 for access to major buildings and estates and institutions and business hubs.

He should let expressways be subjected to ERP and try as far as possible to treat all other tiers as alternate routes to serve the competitiveness of the whole country.

From such a master plan being presented to the parliament he could authoritatively recommend and decide with convincing logic what proportion of the total amount of tax revenues from Vehicles should be allocated for achieving the balance of objectives between expressway versus major roads and access roads:

Excise Duty (110% of OMV at this moment),
COE,
ERP,
licence registration fees road taxes etc received by LTA,
Capital gains from MRT lands etc

If our minister Raymond Lim has such a master plan put up and consistently implemented by his permanent secretary and top civil servants in LTA there is no reason we cannot solve our present problems at all the expressways and ERP roads.

Now there is a lack of clarity in such traffic planning.

Over the next 6 months he should be able to decide (1) building or improving suitable alternate routes on one-to-one volume rato to offer alternative routes to expressways
(2) needs for overpasses and underpasses at serious congestion junctions
(3) linking of existing networks of expressways, major roads and access road to shorten journeys and maintain the balancing of objectives related to expressways and others.

The emphasis should not be to leave the situation alone and use people's congestion woes to increase more ERPs which at the end do not solve problems based on objectives.

The solutions foreseen for buses and MRTs targeted at commuters are only partial solutions and may not give the overall balance needed to solve our problems at this moment.

He will be missing the solutions again if he still keeps solving the symptoms.

phil30k SG

I find this essay full of logic.

I think part of the problem lies with the lack of co-ordination between city planning and the transport ministry.

It looks like transport is playing catch up.

weiqimun SG

my consipracy theory is tt the gahmen has no choice. the residents of spore is burgeoning at a fast rate. they hve no choice but to overhaul or sinkapore will sink in a gridlock if a status quo is maintained. if it is a revamp, then i think the improvement is minimal.

my take is the gahmen will continue to allow a generous pte car population to exists. it cannot cope with more ppl switching to public transport when it is ill prepared for now.

the gahmen need to work on other aspects as well. it needs to continue to diverge it's industries locale so it is more spread out. the travel pattern, flow has to be regulated with this as well.

this is a tough challenge. presently, i think it is doing a good job. i take the public transport to work once a week as an alternative to driving. travel time doubles to an hour but it is still relatively seamless. i can catch up on the papers or a book i have yet to complete, so it is pretty good for me at least. Smile

phil30k SG

It's funny that you mention that. I take public transport or taxis. I use public transport time to read, think about things and I tend to chit chat with the taxi drivers. I always thought driving was a little like wasting time. Also I can't afford it.

oxford mushroom SG

There is a simple solution that will solve most of our problems but it is not politically palatable. Limit domestic vehicle ownership by limiting COEs and pour more resources into public transport. The proposed changes represent a step in the right direction, but it would go further if COEs are halved and vehicles are taken off the roads.

Alas! Most Singaporeans want their cars even if public transport is cheap and convenient. I guess they can't make out in the MRT trainl Mr. Green

CX SG

Small correction.

Excise duty is 20% of CIF price. The resulting price after payment of excise and gst is the OMV.

The 110% on top of that is the ARF paid to LTA.

phil30k SG

Some vehicles are used to conduct business. Gathering the information to manage it may be viewed with suspicion.

Doubletalk SG

Carpooling, for example... Mr. Green
http://imall.ntu.edu.sg/ProductDetail.asp?ProductID=10406&categoryName=Transportation

eagle SG

Being able to drive a car is more of a matter of convenience, a form of transport as and when you need it.

Public transport is acceptable only if you have the time to spare. But for my upcoming workplace, it is just a few MRT stops away, so I don't see any necessity to get a car to drive to work after I start working for a while.

reddressman SG

sg is super tiny.

there is no reason why going from point A to point B should not be excellent.

excellent service is the least of the least of my expectations.

if need my help to improve, call me.

to me, its not difficult.

SpeedStar SG

For the first time I agree with u. If we have an excellent public transport, why do we still need a car?

Hopefully the government will come up with something to improve the public transport. Heard the frequency of the train is getting from bad to worse. And for overcrowding of cars in the city is a very common thing. So far I have yet to see a system that really controlled very well and not hurting the pocket for the citizens. I may be wrong, but this is so far what I have seen. Wink

onlooker123 SG

Actually it is very easy to remove congestion from the CBD.

Just remove the parking lots in the CBD. Laughing

reddressman SG

As said, its not difficult at all.

hiphop2009 SG

Limiting it may cause problems like "COE blackmarket".

needs lots of studies before this suggestion is ever taken into consideration.

claudetnt SG

The main cause of our transportation problem is the involvement of the government in an area they know / knew nothing about!

Firstly, they got rid of the many bus companies and merged all these companies forcibly.
into one and later to 2. Now, its going to be expanded again to more than 2. Raymond and his team must offload the LTAs burden of running transportation. LTA is too big and is incompetent in the management of our transportation system with all these piecemeal plans. The expressways are still congested; passengers have to wait too long for most bus services, the MRT and taxi services are going from bad too worse - The MRT trains are overcrowded due to the long waiting time for each train and the taxi services are expensive and yet not easily accessible unless we do phone booking.

Its time Raymond retire, honourably.

hloc SG

IMHO..... the Govt made the wrong decision when they allowed public transportion company to list in the stock market.... and no longer under Govt's control. Like all others companies in the World..... a listed company's 1st objective is to earn money..... not to serve the 'Users', but the 'Shares Holders'.

Before SMRT was listed in the early 2000...... they made $100 million profits on most years. That is $100 millions after deduction...... Exclamation But PM Goh had the idea of SMRT going aboard to expand their Rail business. Knowing how foregin countries view foregin GLC in control of their public asset, the Govt decided that SMRT will be listed as a 'Normal' company without link to the Govt.

Problem arise when SMRT is now more intrested in making money for the shares holder than to providing an alternate mode of transportion to replace private cars.....

We all knows that S'pore is a small country with limited rooms for roads..... Shouldn't priority be to make the public transportion sector cheaper & better thans private cars.. Exclamation As long as such companies are making profits to cover their yearly cost...... that should be good enough Without 'Shares Holder', there isn't a need to have increase profit year after year...... that would also means lower fares for all

Let SMRT keep half of the profit..... let them use it to upgrade or buy new trains. The other half of the profit could be channel back into a fund that helps the poor or sickly S'poreans.

Ramsey SG

Raymond Lim... hmmm. is that the same idiot who deduced that since number of cars increase after implementation of ERP, hence ERP help Singaporeans own car?!?!

My son grows taller every year. I allow my son to drink cocacola from time to time, hence cocacola makes my son grow taller!! hahaha

I only have 1 word to describe this: IDIOT!!

weiqimun SG

car ownership doesn't necessarily increase road congestion. usage does. tt's the rationale given by the policy makers. i only agree partially. why on earth wld 1 own a car and not use it. a piece of furniture.

controlling coe is not a full solution either. there will always be a strata of ppl who will be able to afford the coe, regardless of what is the price. remember the $100k coe? and ppl who r pissed off for not being able to afford a car may take it out on the gahmen for making it so out-of-reach.

hence, my earlier point abt tt there is no easy solution. i think topmost on the agenda wld be to improve/overhaul the public transport system. tt will draw the ppl to take the train/bus. in fact, if we can reach the intended destination faster or at about the same time when taking the mrt as with driving, that will convert the skeptics. this can happen. look at japan. chances are, if u take the train, u probably reach your destination earlier than someone who drives. I wld argue the same situation in HK as well.

here, it is not happening yet.

charlize SG

Originally posted by Ramsey:
Raymond Lim... hmmm. is that the same idiot who deduced that since number of cars increase after implementation of ERP, hence ERP help Singaporeans own car?!?!

My son grows taller every year. I allow my son to drink cocacola from time to time, hence cocacola makes my son grow taller!! hahaha

I only have 1 word to describe this:[b] IDIOT!![/b]

Hey, maybe next time they will tell you ERP revenue is to help the poor. Laughing

Ramsey SG

On the topic of COE. I read a report on newspaper last week which reported that despite limiting new car registration to 3% per year, there is still a 5% raise in number of cars on the road. I was like, WHAT?! Could you run that by me again?!?! Got illegal car on our road huh? WTF?!?!

Anyway, back to the topic of Singapore Transport problem. The fact is, our public transport system is far from being world class. MRT & buses is indeed just part of the solution. Affordable and good taxi service is the rest of the equation. Our taxi services sucks!!

Lets face it, it's the fare system. Like everything else related to LTA, them seem to think increasing the amount they charge will solve any problem under the sun. So naturally, when people complain of availability of taxi, what do they do? increase fare and surcharges. So the rationale is if price goes up, demand reduce and less people will take cab. Is that solving a problem?!?! If I bring this type of solution to my work, I would have surely lose my job. "Hey boss, customer order is too high, production don't have capacity to turn products out. We need to increase price so that customer will order less." I can imagine my boss' face if I ever bring this solution to him to solve production capacity issues. But somehow, our million dollors scholars/elites are turning out exactly this type of solution.

I say the solution is simple. Scrap all surcharges except ERP. Raise the starting fee to S$4.00. You will never have taxi drivers hiding. I mean look at HK or even Shanghai. I never have taxi problems when I was stationed in those places.

Still, despite many people writing in to suggest this solution, the authority refused to consider it. Its the herd mentality in civil service, I tell you. Who would be brave enough to recommend radical changes? God forbid, if it doesn't work, it will be their million dollar rice bowls.

I was so disappointed with the public transport system in Singapore, 3 weeks after a came back from Shanghai, I decided I am better off owning my own car.