Never Ending Revamp...
Klang Valley transport system seems to be forever going through revamping, privatisation, corporatisation, bailing-out and government take-over.
The latest news is that a major "revamp" is about to take place to attract more passengers. The recently (November'04) set-up government owned Rapid KL, which took over the operations of Putra-LRT, Star-LRT, IntraKota. CityLiner and other bus routes (almost 70%) is proposing a system that will involve the transformation of the 273km rail-based network into the backbone of public transport system.
It is the "hope" if the company that the new system will be efficient and attractive enough to bring in twice the current 470,000 passengers to its LRTs and busses carried daily.
It seems to me that the whole "revamping" exercise carried out so far only results in repainting of all the buses to accommodate the new Rapid KL logo and nothing more. We are still seeing buses being stuck in the middle of the road (not to mention heave traffic) almost daily.
Apart from that, I wonder whose idea was it to change the bus gear transmission system to automatic instead of manual. Seems to me that the automatic transmission system emits higher amount of black smoke and contribute more towards the noise pollution within the city. Furthermore, these buses often break down when going up a slope or hilly area.
I have been taking bus as a means of transport for work for almost one and a half years. During that time, I have to walk almost 1km to the nearest bus-stop from my house also almost 1km from my work place. The situation gets worse during rainy season where I am all soaked up in my feet and yet have to cramped inside a bus that is overloaded with angry people inside (as you might know, there are less buses traveling on the road during rainy season for unknown reason).
After living through that ordeal, I have decided to give up on public transport and get a car. Although a new problem arises with being stuck in traffic jam, I guess it is much better to know that I can adjust to the problem by timing my travel to and back from work. With public transport, sometimes I will reach home at around 8-9pm although I finish work at 5pm!
Based on historical events, I would say that the current "revamping" exercise is nothing but a smoke screen to fool the public into believing that the government is doing something. I guess the biggest winner would be the company(s) that was issued the contract to repaint all the 550 buses each time a routine exercise like this took place.
Cronies at work??
The latest news is that a major "revamp" is about to take place to attract more passengers. The recently (November'04) set-up government owned Rapid KL, which took over the operations of Putra-LRT, Star-LRT, IntraKota. CityLiner and other bus routes (almost 70%) is proposing a system that will involve the transformation of the 273km rail-based network into the backbone of public transport system.
It is the "hope" if the company that the new system will be efficient and attractive enough to bring in twice the current 470,000 passengers to its LRTs and busses carried daily.
It seems to me that the whole "revamping" exercise carried out so far only results in repainting of all the buses to accommodate the new Rapid KL logo and nothing more. We are still seeing buses being stuck in the middle of the road (not to mention heave traffic) almost daily.
Apart from that, I wonder whose idea was it to change the bus gear transmission system to automatic instead of manual. Seems to me that the automatic transmission system emits higher amount of black smoke and contribute more towards the noise pollution within the city. Furthermore, these buses often break down when going up a slope or hilly area.
I have been taking bus as a means of transport for work for almost one and a half years. During that time, I have to walk almost 1km to the nearest bus-stop from my house also almost 1km from my work place. The situation gets worse during rainy season where I am all soaked up in my feet and yet have to cramped inside a bus that is overloaded with angry people inside (as you might know, there are less buses traveling on the road during rainy season for unknown reason).
After living through that ordeal, I have decided to give up on public transport and get a car. Although a new problem arises with being stuck in traffic jam, I guess it is much better to know that I can adjust to the problem by timing my travel to and back from work. With public transport, sometimes I will reach home at around 8-9pm although I finish work at 5pm!
Based on historical events, I would say that the current "revamping" exercise is nothing but a smoke screen to fool the public into believing that the government is doing something. I guess the biggest winner would be the company(s) that was issued the contract to repaint all the 550 buses each time a routine exercise like this took place.
Cronies at work??
posted by Egghead at
9:06 AM
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