Circle line 8th disruption this year

Published Wednesday, December 15, 2011 TODAY Newspaper, headlines

Published Wednesday, December 15, 2011 TODAY Newspaper, page 4

SMRT circle line was disrupted for the 8th time this year, counting only the major disruption that lasted more than 10 minutes. so that equate to a more than 8 number include all disruptions is counted.

Despite LTA monitoring the situation imposing fines, the disruptions saga continues. 

Some observations and comments that I have:

1) Be Honest and let people make the decision 

Inside the article, there was this researcher who mentioned that s/he hear 3 announcements that the train is arriving in 5 to 10 minutes but in the end s/he waited for at least 25 minutes. 

This reminds me of a same experience before, which just pissed me off.  Well, if you make an announcement, you jolly make sure that it is a fact and not something that you hope it to be. If the announcement says that the train is coming in 5 to 10 minutes, then it better arrive in less than 10 minutes. That is the maximum tolerance that I can take.

I would rather SMRT tell me honestly that the next train will arrive in 30 minutes rather than saying the train will arrive in 5 minutes and didn't come. I would rather they under promise and over deliver than to over promise and under deliver. Perhaps what they actually meant is"the train will (hopefully) arrive in 5 minutes."  

If the train is arriving in 30 minutes I, and I believe many other people will,make alternative transport routes or plans. If you are needed to take the train for one or two stops, especially in town, then I believe it may be faster if one get out of the station and takes a bus instead of waiting 30 minutes for the train. In other situation where alternative transport isn't feasible, at least I could better use the time to perhaps do some banking, shopping rather than just standing there and letting my anger escalates.

2) Compensate the people who are affected

The people who are really affected, other than the train operator, are really the commuters.

The only compensation that was offered according to the article is "passenger who are unable to complete their journey due to the disruption can file a claim for refund at the Passenger Service Centre...". This meant that the maximum amount that you can get back is the fare which you paid for the journey which is likely to be less than 2 SGD.

Perhaps the LTA can consider changing their policies that instead of imposing a penalty to the operator, make it a legislation to compensate all affected passengers for the mishap. Not to compensate on time loss, but at least something to 'smoothen the pain'. Maybe 2X to 3X of the fare amount or free rides on the trains for the next few trips, etc.

To the commuters, it smoothen their pain.

To the train operator, it is probably less than the amount of 'penalty' that they have to pay to LTA

To LTA, if this reduces disruptions, then it reflects well on them as policies makes. 

Furthermore, this also makes the train operator to be 'on the balls' especially during peak hours, so that the minimize to compensate to the maximum number of people possible be having disruption-free services, at least during the peak hours.

Win-win-win situation as I call it.