Then what's the point of BCM if everything favour the
incumbents? During SG5999Z trial with TTS,Majority of the BCs is
new to DD and in fact they drove well than seasoned SBST BCs i dare
say.
The issue of assigning demonstrators for trial by the incumbents
cannot be a factor in itself to show that LTA favors the
incumbents. Although I have to agree on the issue that BCM seems to
be existent only in name at the current stage - and this is yet
another poor policy planning on the part of the government; they
took over the bus assets and cut down on operation costs.
Of course, it still seems as an open question as to what is the
list of responsibilities the operators have in receiving the bus
packages - in relation to the point as to how LTA "assess the
criteria" in assigning the demonstrators for trial. I might have
thought of the probability that, if the demonstrator trials do not
add burden the maintenance and operations of those non-incumbents,
perhaps LTA may have assigned them to the non-incumbents.
However, it still remains at LTA's discretion to deem the
incumbents as the priority candidates since they got much more
experience in trying such demonstrators, and they may even need to
operate a large fleet of such models when the time for fleet
replacement come again. I should add on that, given now SG5999Z is
registered, it's more or less confirmed that the trial is
successful and they are keeping the bus permanently (and/or it's a
sign to procure more buses with such specifications). As such, the
question that I just raised in the previous paragraph does not
apply in the context of SG5999Z.