Wow they finally fined 857. I'm not surprised at all. Given that
they refuse to deploy weekday bendies on this service it comes as
no surprise why the frequency can be screwed up. Loading is so high
as this is the only route linking town to Yishun fastest, but I
cannot comprehend why WLDEP refuses to deploy weekday bendies.
Weekend bendies were meant for the weekend crowd, but I find
weekend bendies more un-utilised as compared to the loadings during
weekdays. I once waited 25 mins during evening peak at SOTA
and 3 packed 857s came together. It says alot about it's demand
during critical hours. A bendy would safely take care of that.
As a Yishun resident myself, I don't take the train to town
unless it's urgent because Toa Payoh and southbound thereafter is a
packed nightmare. I can choose 171 or 857 but 171 is seriously too
long to town. So 857 is my only choice, and many other Yishun folks
would take that service too. 45 mins to town, who wouldn't want
that?
Another thing is that this service is a loop service, given that
CTE may jam once in a while it affects the return direction's
frequency. I hope they consider making 857 a bi-directional service
so as to cut down on the irregular frequency in the return
direciton.
Time to wake up WLDEP. Alot of WLDEP services don't need so many
bendies. 857 needs them more.
SMRT believes that it makes more sense to deploy bendies to
their feeder services rather than normal trunk service.
This is called customer service. The moment you alight from the
train, you'll be able to get a space on your feeder bus back home.
Whats the use of having a bendy on a trunk service when 80% of the
time it get stuck in the CTE jam ? It would probably bring in more
revenue for the organisation by running non-stop on their feeder
routes.
Trains are more important to them. Afterall, SMRT Buses is just
a liability to the organisation to begin with.
You think they care about that $100 being lost to PTC (or LTA) ?
Its nothing to them anyway, i believe they can easily earn more
from their passengers who take train from Yishun to town on a
single train trip.
