Will S'pore become Gridlock City?
Packed buses, elusive cabs, traffic jams on Saturday night. When
population hits 6.5m, how?
By Sylvia Toh Paik Choo
July 03, 2007
HOW are we going to deal with this when our population hits its
targeted 6.5 million?
Just look at what happened on Saturday night.
The city went into a gridlock like I had not experienced
before.
I started out from my Farrer Park home at quarter past 7 for
Christina Aguilera's concert, which was to start at the Indoor
Stadium at 8pm.
The cab driver's heart sank when he heard 'stadium'.
'Jam, everywhere jam,' he lamented.
Of course! The National Stadium's closing ceremony. (By night's
end, it was also one of the NDP rehearsals, the last night for
cheaper shopping - before the 2 percentage point GST hike - and the
last cigarette puff in public places.)
Everybody went out with a vengeance and the city came close to
traffic paralysis.
My cab fare to the stadium was $12, exactly double the
normal.
Christina Aguilera was fantastic and worth every dollar ($98 to
$348, but how scary are our ticket prices getting for pop
shows?)
The concert began late, thank goodness, because most of us were
scrambling out of kissing cars, racing across tarmac and turf and
up the stairs.
When we poured out after her encore, we saw red.
There were fireworks from the National Stadium's final party, and
rows and lines and curves of red tail lights, which, in a moment of
fancy, made me think of the necklaces of pigeon blood red rubies
from Van Cleef and Arpels.
Fancy immediately turned to frenzy when it struck us all - how do
we get out of here?
You could not get a taxi booking - the cabs must all be stuck
somewhere.
A short, nervous man spoke into an intercom, 'member, member' and
from what I figured he had a fleet of limos hiding in the bushes
(of course, I exaggerate here) ready to pick up, so I noticed, ang
moh customers.
I was about to ask him if he could book... when an East European
woman and child interrupted: 'We are first'. I told her to relax.
The man quickly moved away.
I asked a man in neon vest directing the chock-a-block traffic for
directions and he made the mistake of saying: 'I don't know.'
I pointed to his uniform and gave him a piece of my mind. He then
showed presence of mind: 'If not, I ask my officer help you.'
And the whole thing went on - bumper-to-bumper traffic inching
along, party and pop people running to and from two bus stops in
search of a way out of the stadium grounds. Where is Bruce Willis
when he is needed to sort out a disaster like this one?
If a city of four-million-plus can be paralysed by a hundred
thousand going out to two events in the same area on the same day,
how will we cope when the number is bumped up by another two
million?
In cities like London, on a hot summer's day, I have seen fights
break out right in the middle of crowded Piccadilly Circus, tempers
fraying in the heat, the rush and the crush.
Did anyone stop to break the fisticuffs? Of course not - everyone
was busy scurrying to whatever it was that was drawing them on.
Leave it to the police.
Are we bidding to build ourselves up like Dubai? They can, they
have vast deserts in their backyard to pile into.
But wait a minute - there is still land around the island. You
become aware of it when you take a bus ride.
And that was how I arrived home, two hours after the concert - via
Ang Mo Kio.
There were empty buses in the bay and a nice SBS chap said: 'Hello,
how are you?'
I told him: 'Quite confused, donno how to get out.'
And he said: 'But at least you remember your name, Paik Choo.' And
he showed me where to go.
The special services were designated for Ang Mo Kio, Orchard Road,
Boon Lay. The Orchard buses looked like the ones you see in Indian
movies, passengers holding the doors together.
I had a birthday party to go to, so I leapt into the Ang Mo Kio
double-decker. On the highway, it said: Heavy traffic.
The party was in Telok Kurau. Never made it. Happy birthday,
Michelle. The present would have been a Christina Aguilera
impersonation.
