who know with the change in the minister/policy etc etc, we
might see SMRT give up on their bus operations etc? or the govt
might be announcing some subsidies soon that why they are holding
back .. guess there must be something going on right now which we
are not aware of after so many complains...
and a lof of public keep on asking for competition and ask for
more companies to provide bus public transports. the barriers of
entry is so high? how many buses you need to buy at a start? 200?
where to hire all the BCs/maintainence personal etc etc.. do u
think some company will spend S$100 million to buy buses to provide
public transport service and then when they ask for S$0.01 increase
in bus fares, kenna complain right in the face? and if buses were
late by 1 min, kenna complain again.. seriously i dun think any one
will bother to join to provide bus services here...
I think they would rather go spend that S$100 million on some
other business (say maybe taxi?). S$100 million can buy more than
1000 taxis for the company to earn good income liao and no need to
worry about drivers etc.. just give better rental rates and drivers
will come to you.
We just have to wait and see if anything is going to be done
with regards to subsidies and such. It's possible as per what you
mentioned about complains not being resolved.
With regards to the cost of entry into public transport, those
points are valid points. I believe LTA/PTC is trying to move us
towards how buses in london is being operated. For example, in
london: routes tendered to different company and bidded for. buses
are purchased by companies themself, and they have to meet key
performance targets and goals, fares are also controlled by tfl.
This is very similar to what we are moving towards.
However, there's a very critical point that we are different
from london. Compare the fares. Their fares start from £1.30 (about
SGD$2.60), and is capped at £4(about SGD$8) per day. Our fares
is not even of comparison to theirs. This is probably why there are
many companies willing to buy new buses and bid for routes, because
its relatively easier to recoup operational costs.
I do not think that our fares should increase, but as per what
you have mentioned, the govt might need to provide some subsidies
or incentives in order for the private sector to be willing to fork
out money and run public transport.
