However, I feel more can be done to improve public transportation, apart from the measures proposed.

Central planning of bus routes is not a bad idea but how does one know whether the routes planned are indeed the best?

Transfers are a common and unnecessary cause of more time being spent on public transport. There are two ways technology can help here.

First, most commuters use the ez-link card. There is a potential wealth of data here that can be used to provide a picture of where commuters with transfer trips begin and end their journeys.

This will identify routes where the public-transportation system can serve commuters better by providing direct services, or increased capacity on existing direct services, during peak hours.

In addition, it will also identify routes where the public-transportation system can provide express services during peak hours.

Second, another way technology can help is to provide a website for members of the public to vote for new routes as an alternative to their present routes.

The Government should allow bus companies to operate some of these routes only during peak hours, so as to prevent the operators from incurring losses operating them at other times.

Everything has a cost. In the past, bus operators were expected to operate non-financially viable routes, subsidising them with gains from the profitable ones. This is wasteful and detrimental to the environment.

Such minor routes might be better operated by smaller companies operating smaller buses or even vans. These buses could provide an even better service by being allowed to be flexible about their actual routes, and even stopping at passenger-specified locations instead of only at bus stops. During rainy weather, they could even be allowed to alight passengers at sheltered drop-offs at HDB blocks or multi-storey carparks.

By allowing different types of operators to operate different routes, under the supervision of the ministry, public transportation could be optimised.

By enabling commuters to take buses plying the routes they actually need instead of whatever is available, there would be less wastage of resources, and, hopefully, less congestion caused by unnecessary detours, as well as encouraging more to take public transport.

Chen JunYi

OPTIMISE ROUTES

Enabling commuters to take buses plying the routes they actually need would encourage more to switch to public transport.