This would be the eighth hike out of 11 attempts made by the transport companies to PTC to increase fare and so far no one has raised a heckle till now. I am sure the minister should know why. For example, last Saturday we experienced the Kranji train line break-down affecting thousands of commuters and many have to scale the track in order to exit the station. Many of us watching the pictures of people walking on the track are half afraid that some may fall off the track or faint in the sizzling afternoon heat. On Sunday, there was also the LRT break-down at Bkt Panjang which was fortunately rectified within an hour. Just yesterday on Monday, the North-south line was again down during the morning peak-hour affecting close to 19,000 passengers rushing off to work. The man-hours lost must be massive and I am sure many important contracts are missed during this operational fault. There is also this joke that if you have a big deal to close in the morning best to take a cab as there is every chance our trains will break down and I am afraid that this saying is coming true now. Most unfortunately, all these train mishaps happened within a consecutive three-day span further cementing the crude fact that we need to tackle a growing massive problem of operational unreadiness. Many commuters also questioned if the then-CEO Saw’s negligence in looking after the operational aspects of the rail lines have now returned to haunt us all. Then-CEO Saw has focused much of her attention on growing revenue by exploring the renting out of retail space to the detriment of technical readiness of the train lines. Should we now not postpone the fare hike minister till Singaporeans are assured of a minimum operational standard for our trains? Many of us take the trains to work and there is no viable alternative. We are literally held at ransom’s point if the fare hike comes true in April and I am sure many commuters are angry at the frequent train break-downs and hiking the fare now will surely piss many people off. We are not asking for the hike to be put off permanently but only implement it if our trains are running smoothly and to our satisfaction – we are after all paying for the rides. We also ask SMRT to look into the frequent train break-down as they have to answer to paying commuters. We need a more thorough explanation from the transport company why trains broke down so frequently than the usual non-committal “operational fault”.
Posted on: Sun, 26 Jan 2014 04:41:22 +0000
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