I believe not many people are happy about the hub and spoke
concept nowadays because of the mulitple transfers they have to
make just to get from point A to point B.
Why are so many incidents of people fighting over seats
recently? I don't think having lesser seats is suitable for our
context. Think of all those working long hours everyday as well, do
you think they like to stand for the whole trip and transfer many
times just to go to work and go home? And not many are smart
experts, which in fact, most commuters want the simpliest way to
get from point A to B.
Even if with a hub and spoke concept, I believe maintaining a
full single decker fleet is good enough. They are flexible and bus
stops can hold at least 2 buses of different services at the same
time which is faster and more efficient.
You are wrong.
Once people got used to the system, practically everyone I know
now liked the hub and spoke system.
And it makes far more sense than taking train only.
Or taking bus only.
The flexibility I now gain from having the liberty to alight,
drink tao huey zhui, and then take another bus to another
destination is tremendous.
And now taking feeder bus to my house from the MRT station is
such an attractive option instead of walking 15 minutes in the sun
to save 60 cents.
And perhaps you do not travel like I do on a daily basis. I can
switch buses up to 3x per trip to try to find a good balance
between having seats and reaching my destinations quickly.
Call it troublesome. But consider my trip to Bedok from Hougang
Ave 8 this morning:
If I take the train only (NEL=>CCL=>EWL), I take around 50
minutes, including a 15 minutes walk from my house.
By contrast, despite walking 10 minutes, and then switching
buses 3 times and having to wait 10 minutes, and 5 minutes for the
first 2 buses (62=>25=>28), I took 40 minutes to reach Bedok
MRT. And the trip was cheaper!
You should not discount the flexibility in planning trips
courtesy of this new system.
