Thinking about it, there was another reason why I chose to split
173, and that was to link the Hume (and Chestnut) estates with
Hillview MRT and Bt Panjang. This link would be utilised better
than the current one from Hume to Bt Batok. (I wouldn't want to
touch the longer trunks, i.e. 75, 171, 184, 961, just for these
short sectors.)
Considering the demand for Hume and Chestnut is generally low,
while that for BB East Ave 4, Hillview Ave and Yew Tee is
moderately high, it makes sense to operate the services separately
for these two sections, with different bus intervals.
Thus we have:
I wouldn't say demand for Hume is that low... 173 is currently
the only service there and I do see quite a lot of people boarding
there even during off-peak hours. Thus if the routes are split as
per your suggestion, it would make sense to operate at higher
frequency.
Other than that, good suggestion.