In my opinion, cutting a few of these services do indeed benefit
the LTA. BUT the inconvenience they cause to the public is worse
than their intended benefit. Let's take a few services for example
and maybe some things I would suggest if necessary:
If Service 16 were to be cut, it is impossible because though
the people travelling to the east (meaning Bedok and Marine Parade)
from Bukit Merah is not so demanding, there are indeed people from
the Bedok, Marine Parade, Joo Chiat and Dunman stretch who have to
travel to places like Nicoll Highway and Orchard. Unless they do
shorten 16 to the Stadium Link OR split it into 2 services which
terminate at Stadium Link and Marina Centre OR in an extent the
commuters are forced to take the CCL.
If Service 61 were to be cut, I wouldn't mind, as VERY FEW
people actually bother to even take 61 from Bukit Batok to Kallang
Bahru since 985 provides a faster link. For 61, at least splitting
the service into 2 would not be as murderous, as the demand is
acutally more in certain places than others. For 61, it can be
split to terminate at Marina Centre for the Bukit Batok stretch and
New Bridge Road for the other.
858 was a service mentioned in the article. But for long-travel
distance services like 39, 161, 168, 858, 965, 969 and maybe even
853C and 854, it is impossible to cut them. Because there are sure
to be a considerable amount of people travelling from the Point A
terminus to the Point B terminus. And for 858, if it were to be
shortened, it defeats the purpose of the recent Sembawang
amendment. The least they could do is actually allow the drivers to
take a 10 minute break at CGA PTB 2 (which is what I saw on the 1st
day) before leaving for WRI, thus, making the 170 minute run time
actually seem shorter for the drivers.
Lastly, if services were to be split or shortened, the LTA has
to take into the consideration of the parking spaces allocated for
the bus services as some interchanges are already faced with lack
of enough parking space, like Marina Centre Terminal and New Bridge
Road terminal to name a few. So the splitting of the services might
cause a congestion at the terminals and delay the time even
more.
And what's more, what will happen to the drivers of these
affected services? If 61 were to be affected, will some drivers be
forced to be SMRT Standbys or will they have the alternative choice
to go over to an SBST service that follows part of 61's route?
