SMRT NSEW line breakdown / disruption 7 Jul 2015 (Affected public transport commuters)

The 2nd major train breakdown since 2011. 

Although the breakdown in 2011 train services were resumed only the next day (longer), this breakdown affected the NS and EW line (read: WHOLE Singapore). So which is more serious, you decide yourself.

I am sure you have all the facts from the mainstream news, social newsfeeds, media, etc already so I am not going into that

Instead I will give my 2 cents on some of the issues / suggestions on what could be done.

People affected were not only those on the trains and waiting to board the trains but also those who took buses (with no intention of taking trains). My mum was one of them and she wanted to take a bus home after work. However, due to the spill off of people from the train stations, she had to wait a few buses to go by before she can board one.  Quite a notable amount of her time is spent on waiting for the bus.And even the bus she boarded, it was extremely crowded.

While free (no cost to commuters) shuttle buses were deployed as an alternative services to train services, the queues are ridiculously long (1 single deck bus can carry less than 100 passengers while 1 train can carry 1000 passengers). It is no wonder many people gave up and went to take other bus services that calls at their MRT stop.

I am not very sure if these bus services are free but even if they are, it is only free at the bus stop at the MRT station. The rest of the bus stops are not. 

Since train disruption affects the both train and bus commuters (even taxi commuters but I dont want to go into that) why not make public transport free for that few hours? People will have more choices and do not need to rely solely on the free shuttle buses. Those bus passengers affected will also get some sort of compensation of a free bus ride. 

You may be asking, all buses islandwide free who will pay for the cost? Afterall, it is not SBS Transit's fault and they should not be penalised.

Yes, i agree, SBST has done a good job be it in trains and buses and should not be penalised However, dont forget that after all the investigations, LTA will have impose a penalty on the disrupted train operator. Instead of specifying a fixed amount like S$1 million for 2011 disruption, the penalty will be that the penalised operator to pay for all trips made by commuters during this period of down time. I think it's win-win because LTA don't get accused of always fining the operator with no benefits to commuters and commuters get compensated for inconvenience by getting free rides.(Its probably insufficient but again its better than nothing) 

And talking about fines  I don't understand why the authorities fine the transport operators like normal companies. Whenever there is a fine, in the operator's books, it will be reflected likely as a expenditure=cost and after a while they will say cost is increasing and they need to submit a request to increase fare. Maybe there should be special treatment for these operators to pay their fines from their NET PROFIT so that their cost wouldn't be affected.  This way, they will be more motivated to ensure a smooth running system as pressure will come from their shareholders. 

Smove Car sharing

Firstly, to clarify, this is not a sponsored post. Just want to share because i find it worthwhile. 

As with my previous post in March 2015 (view it here) , I never liked car sharing because of 2 main reasons, one - the limited free mileage and two - the need to return the vehicle to the same location.

Smove car sharing totally addressed this 2 issues spot on for me.

The company started out as with a pure electric car fleet before switching to the current fleet of hybrid Prius-Cs. Their system is simple. Pay a one-time fee of $19 (See how you can get a rebate to waive it off below) and start driving at $5 per 15 mins. No petrol or mileage or other hidden cost.

One of Smove Prius-C 

(Image taken from smove.sg)

So $20 per hour isn't exactly cheap...I hear you but it does offer you the flexibility of renting for less than an hour. Say half an hour or 2 hours 15 mins and you are really paying for the time you are in the car and not for time when the car is parked at the carpark.

I'll be honest with you, having joined a few previously, the above reason isn't enough to make me want to join another car sharing scheme. What's alluring me to join is this:

You can collect a car at a location and return it at another location. 

WOW! That makes sense for me. Let me tell you a place which I like to go but am always put off by taking public transport there > IKEA Alexandra. It's nowhere near a train station and for bus services only 2 comes from Redhill mrt and 1 comes from Queenstown mrt and they are not really frequent.

Now I can spend $5, take the car at Commonwealth MRT (one of their locations) and return it at Anchorpoint (another of their location). Then I just cross the road. I can even take up to 4 friends with me and I don't have to pay a single cent for parking. That's what I called flexible.

And, what's more I checked with Smove, as they are using very fuel efficient hybrid cars, the Prius C,

They does not have mileage limits on their cars

So no matter how far i drive,  my cost is fixed at $20 per hour.

Yes, I hear you say that how far can I drive in half an hour or an hour? But what about their 'package deals':

Weekdays (Mon till Fri): 10am to 5pm at $60. That's 7 hours for the price of 3 hours. 

Weeknights (Mon till Thu) 6:30pm to 8:30am at $40. Drive off from a station near your office and return next morning you come back to office.

On times like weekends starting from Friday nights and outside the above timings, it's still at an rather affordable $90 per 12 hours or $130 per 24 hours. Remember this is the actual amount you have to spend (except for ERP and carparks). No petrol cost, no hidden cost, no variable cost and comprehensive insurance is covered. 

Check them out their website at Smove.sg. Click on this link and get $20 credit from Smove while promotion lasts. That means its more than enough to offset the one time fee and there is no joining fee.

Something interesting - The whole time you have the car, there is no car key. To unlock the car, you simply tab your pre-registered EZlink card at the device next to the IU and the car will unlock itself. To lock, tab the card again. To end your trip, lock the car and send an SMS to Smove to end your booking.

Tab EZLink card to unlock and lock

(Image taken from smove.sg)

So far they have their locations mainly at the south-western side of Singapore but I was told that they will expand so we look forward to that.

Travel Smart Rewards - Improvements that I would like to see

I posted a few days ago on the Travel Smart Rewards scheme which manages peak period crowd and encourage people to travel earlier or later to work.

Read:
Public Transport made Interesting - LTA's scheme to manage morning peak crowd

Of course, the scheme is launched not too long ago and I think it's a fantastic scheme for people like me. Like many things, nothing is perfect, so I would like to suggest some improvements that I would like to see in the future.

Peak vs Off Peak
Peak trips and off peak trips current both earn the same number of points.. To encourage people to move out of peak, any time outside the peak period, more points should be given. Even a 2 points per km is double the points of the current 1 point per km.

Evening Peak
LTA may think it is not necessary at this time as people are more relaxed in the evening and have better flexibility of their time as it is after work. However, it is the  very same reasons that make people more willing to get out of peak period and travel in the decongesting evening period (maybe 4:45pm to 5:30pm and after 8pm to 930pm).

Buses
I am sure extending the scheme to buses is already in  LTA's planning and they are likely to extend it. However, to make people stop taking train and start taking buses, the scheme will have to be more attractive on buses and more services will be needed to do direct from the town to the city centre. There is a service to and from my town to the city centre but I do not take because 1) I have to take another bus to get to the bus stop which has the city-direct service and 2) there are only a few trips in morning and in the evening and also 3) they get very crowded and no seats are available.  

Public Transport made Interesting - LTA's scheme to manage morning peak crowd

(Image credits to its owner)

Taking the train to work every morning?? Read on.

Travel Smart Rewards - Earn rebates while doing (really) nothing when you travel on trains

It has been about 1.5 months since I joined Travel Smart Rewards - TSR (www.travelsmartrewards.sg).

In brief, this programme is LTA's move to encourage people to adjust their travelling schedule and move out peak period and into the less peak period. You get points for every km travelled. The incentive is that when you travel in one of the less peak period they designate (they call it decongesting period), you get your points multi folds to up to 8X. These points can either be used to redeem for cash at a very low rate: 1000 points = S$1 or they can be used to play their Spin to win game and win cash along the way. 1000 points can win you a few dollars (up to $200 as the say) depending on your luck. [You can set it in your settings page -See below]

(Screenshot from www.travelsmartrewards.sg)

The amazing thing about this is that there is an automatic spin feature which they will help you play the game every week and what you need to do is really NOTHING except to wait for the winnings to come in, and they will email you every week if you have a $1 or more winning(s).  Even crediting the cash out of the programme doesn't take you any effort. They will just credit your winnings into your EZlink card which you can use to offset your future trips.

(Screenshot from www.travelsmartrewards.sg)

I am not sure if I can be considered lucky compared to others out there who has been using this scheme but to have a rebate of $8 for 1.5 months into the programme, I am rather pleased. Of course, I travel a considerable distance from home to my work (about 20km) and I travel at the time the TSR people encourages us to travel every week day (ie: 8:45am to 9:45am), hence i believe I get more points than many people. 

As comparison, my sis whom I encouraged, has enrolled herself into this programme. She also travel 20+km everyday but she doesn't have the opportunity to travel many times in the decongesting period, hence her points is much less. Her winnings is about $2 for about a month of travel. Actually that's not bad at all in terms or rebates. Here's why:

Considering credit card rebates which is one of the other programmes which give you rebates back from your spendings on public transport. Citibank SMRT credit card gives $0.60 rebate but charges you $0.25 transaction fee for every auto-reload of $30 (default I think). Hence, the net rebates is $0.35. On a $90 or 3 reloads basis, the rebates for the month is $1.05. 

Hence even if winnings is $2 from TSR, the rebates is already double of what the credit cards are offering. What's more, the money savvy people will register and use their Citibank SMRT cards into the TSR programme and earn rebates from both sides. (It's allowed)

So start register yourself into the programme and start earning the rebates. Anyway, all the effort you need is the registration process and everything afterwards is automatic - no effort required.

(This is not a sponsored post and I just want to share my experience on something that's I feel is beneficial to me and I would like you, my readers to know about it and take advantage of it)

Car Sharing in Singapore

I am not a big fan of car sharing after signing up for a few scheme a few years ago. And the reasons are obvious.

1) First, it is the limited mileage - Most, if not all, car sharing scheme pay for your petrol but limit your mileage to like around 10km per hour or 30km per overnight. For people like me, if I want to use a car overnight, a trip from my home in the north to town and back will be more than 30km. That's excluding running other errands (and of course you would when you have a car at your disposal)

What happens after you exceed the limit, you are charged $0.40 per km. So either you just drive your car around the neighbourhood, which is kinda impossible for me, or pay an additional fold for the 'optional' mileage charge.

I give you an example.  Say a particular car sharing scheme I am enrolled in offers me overnight usage for $30 per night from 6pm to 8am and give you 30km free mileage, thereafter to be charged at $0.40 per km.

Say collection at Toa Payoh. So i drive from Toa Payoh to Tiong Bahru (12km) to pick up my wife. Then we go City hall for dinner (4 km). Then after that we go pick up something at MBS (5km) and then we head home to Woodlands (30km). Next morning, I drive from home to return the car to Toa Payoh. (15km). Total 66km. Exceed: 36km. Cost: $14.40. Total Cost: $44.40

Trust me, that's a typical night mileage and not exaggerated. When you have a car, you may want to go a few more places like our parents house, more errands and such. That's because there are some things that you will leave to do when you have a car and in the end you may even plan a trip from town to Punggol to collect something from a friend before you head home.

2) Returning at the same location -  As with all car rentals, due to logistic arrangement, for car sharing, we need to return the car back to the same location. It's fine for rental because you have at least 24 hours to run your errants and return the car. For car sharing, you have an hour or two and you have to do your stuffs and get back to your location where you took your car. Doesn't make sense right?

Although it is a norm for car rental companies and car rental companies usually have staffs to receive you when you return the car (the staffs need to check for damage as well). However, for car sharing, as most of the system is computerised when returning the car is nothing more than sending a message to the system, why can't something be done to improve on this?


Update: 27 April 2015

Read my new post on Smove car sharing, a totally new concept that redefine car sharing in Singapore.

Will you cycle to work in hot, sunny, wet Singapore?

Read:
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/singapore/10-ideas-to-make/1427468.html?cid=FBSG

With the highs of COEs and heavy traffics on the road as well as on the MRT trains, would you switch to cycling to office?

For me, cycling, NO.

Firstly, my house to office is about 30km and even if I travel at average 30kmh, it will need exactly one hour for me to reach office. And ask any cyclist, to maintain 30kmh and above speed isn't really a easy feat. Trust me.

Secondly, in hot humid Singapore, even if you manage to average 30kmh in the morning, you are likely to end up sweating when you reach office. So unless you have a shower facility at your office or unless you are a gym instructor or a life guard, it's likely you're going to work in sweat-stained skin.

Thirdly, Singapore laws states that you have to ride on the road (not pavement) with the fast moving car driven by anxious, kan cheong, impatient drivers (you get the meaning), so that will put me in a dangerous, to which, sorry, I am not willing to take this risk, not when I am travelling at 20kmh and they are travelling at at least 70kmh.

There is one thing, however, that lure me back to the 2 wheel machine - the electric-ation of bicycles and the introduction of electric skate scooter.

On the electric bicycles, the inconvenience of point 1 and 3 above stays the same but it kinda solves the problem state in point 2. If you do not need to pedal or only pedal when necessary, you are likely to excrete less sweat and hence more likely to reach the office dry (or drier than taking a normal one).

The electric scooters are the interesting ones because they allow for partial journey transportation. Part of my whole journey I ride of the e-scooter and then I simply fold it up and take a train (with it, of course) and then I fold down and continue my journey on the scooter again. Something you cannot do with an electric bicycle. This is extremely good for people who need to walk / take a bus to the mrt station and walk / take a bus from the mrt station to the destination.

Riding to office from home is out for me, but I am still keeping my options open on the electric 2 wheelers to run errands nearby my house or perhaps at the maximum go to the next town.

Seen: Umbrella Sharing Point @ Yishun MRT

Seen on the floor while walking through the covered pathway to Yishun MRT station. Not sure if this is a new initiative or was this implemented somewhere already. 

I guess generally this is good, it's not so clear what one should do. Do i throw my used umbrella that I don't want in the blue box or do I pass my Burberry umbrella there to a stranger to use after reaching the station, and my contact as well with the hope that the stranger will return the umbrella to me one day. 

   

While I am not serious with the scenarios above, the box will be good as useless until somebody demonstrate or at least explain what the box is used for. I know i sound very Singaporean, everything also need instruction but I don't really can see how this work without.

Having said that, I guess the relevant parties are preparing for the umbrella sharing campaigns and will be pushing them out real soon.

COE Categorisation - is something wrong, LTA?

VW Passat with its 1390cc engine and 122bhp goes into Cat A

in the current LTA COE categorisation system. 

(Image credits to its owner)

CarBuyer Singapore ran this article on Sept 2 "How to 'fool' the LTA" on getting premium cars like Merc and BMW into mainstream 'Cat A' category.

Read:
https://sg.news.yahoo.com/fool-lta-143020130.html

Previously, LTA COE system only factor of consideration is the engine cc. Vehicle at and below 1600cc will fall under Category A while cars more than 1600cc will fall under Category B. Simple as that.

However,  due to improvement in technologies, large cars like VW Passat, Audi A4 all introduced smaller cc engine but with larger power output. Hence more cars can get into Cat A (Cat A price is usually lower) and benefit from the lower COE. LTA reacted to this and recently added an additional criteria - a car has to be equal or less than 1600cc AND equal or less than 130bhp in order to be classified under Cat A.

Yet, within the article car manufacturer Merc and BMW managed to 'fool' LTA by introducing lower cc lower output cars so that their cars are able to fit Cat A criteria once again. And we are taking about cars like Merc C-class and Volkswagen Passat, some are cars that goes head to head with Toyota Camry, a true 2.0litre and above sedan.

A large triggering factor to this trend will be that since manufacturer charge premium prices for their cars, they have the additional profits for the freeplay which could mean changing another engine to developing entirely a new model to suit the criteria, any criteria that LTA sets.

To make Cat A truly 'mainstream' and to have a fairer, LTA should go right into the heart of the question and categorise using the PRICE of the car. Price before COE or even OMV should be used to categories COE (and IMO, road tax as well). If a manufacturer wants to get into Cat A, it will have to drop its price to a certain level which due to the cost of premium cars, they are not likely nor have the motivation to do so unless COE goes sky high for Cat B and rock bottom for Cat A.

SMRT - Why no double decker?

As you know, SMRT Buses (SMB) came from Trans-Island Buses (TIB).  As the name imply trans-island, which is across island. This can be seen from bus services like 969 (Woodlands- Tampines) 858 (Woodlands-Changi Airport), 857 (Yishun-Town), 852 (Yishun-Lorine-Bt Batok)

As you might have observed, right from the company started, their routes were planned in such a way that the bus straight from one town to another (whether via expressway). Nothing like its rival where the routes seems to be going in circles, stopping at every bus stop possible within one town.

When people board the bus, it is likely that they need to take the bus to go from one town to another, not within the town, which means that time expected on the bus is likely to be at least 15 minutes to an average of 35-45 minutes on the bus.

So, while they do have articulated (bendy) high capacity buses, they never had double deckers (DD), something which puzzled me. It doesn't make sense because, comparatively, if SBS Transit (SBST）operating within towns have double deckers, then why there is no double deckers on SMB when their routes are considered long distance? It just doesn't tally with its then corporate philosophy.

Over the years, it seems that SMB stubbornly refuse to purchase DD for reasons not known but I speculate that it may be due to that they do not want to 'copy' SBST to operate DD. Had SBST not have DD, I am rather confident to say that they would very likely go for DD 'to be the first' in Singapore'.  (Look at their taxis and range of bus - Man A22, Hino Hs3KRKK, first to buy Citaros etc)

Nevertheless, there are a few reasons that I think SMB should get DD in their fleet

1) Being a service organisation, is it more important to be concerned with copying competitors or passengers comfort which ultimately equates to providing a better service? Is the 'face/ego' factor so important from SMRT such that they would rather let 24* more passengers (or customers as they like to call it) stand for 15 minutes per trip? 24 pax per trip x 200 trips is about 4800 pax each day affected. It may not seems a lot, but it will if you are one of the 4800.

*Comparing Volvo B9TL seating capacity of 83 compared to 0405G seating capacity of 59 
(Source: http://sgwiki.com/wiki/Singapore_Bus_Specification) 


Also, if there are say 70 passenger on board, all 70 passengers get to sit in the DD compared to some passengers who will have to stand when a Bendy Bus is deployed. This is quite a common situation as in a Bendy bus, you always see somebody standing because all the seats are filled up.

2) As it had been experienced and debated, articulated bus takes up more space in the bus bay making major bus stops less efficient in commuters turnover. LTA has ordered not to have any more (increase) of articulated buses. So, the situation now is that if SMB still stick to its stubborn thinking, they are just left with deploying rigid single deckers to their routes which during the peak hours, always do not have enough capacity to move the crowd.

Also, talk about the issue of a shortage of bus drivers. If there is insufficient bus drivers, then why are SMB not using higher capacity buses (1 driver : 130 passengers) and still using (1 driver: 90 passenger). If higher capacity buses are used, they will need about a third less drivers that they currently  need. (2 high capacity buses and drivers serve almost the same amount of passengers as 3 single decker buses and drivers).  

3) Moving back to its original philosophy - Trans-Island Bus services or put it in my terms: Across island bus services. Although it is not longer called TIBS now, the routes remains the same and DD can accomplish the task more efficiently and effectively than Bendy Buses. SBST Service 161 and 168 (Woodlands to East areas of Singapore) proves the fact.

An imaginery livery of a DD which we all hope to see it comes true.

Hence, if SMB people are reading this, I hope that while they are still making a decision on how to utilise their part of the $1.1billion from the government for new buses, they will put DD into serious consideration as with the current situation and population (expected to further increase), it is not hard to see why DD, any DD should be the choice for SMB.

“More" COE...Really??

(Source: http://www.todayonline.com/Hotnews/EDC120712-0000135/More-COEs-for-big-cars-for-next-6-months)

More COE for big cars for the next 6 months is the title of this article by today on 

12 Jul 2012.  Well, is it???

On reading further on the article, below are facts extracted from the above article: 

1239 - 786 = 453 (or 36.6%) reduction in small cars (Cat A) COE supply.

701 - 699 = 2 (or 0.29%) increase in big cars (Cat B) COE supply.

617 - 485 = 132 (or 21.4%) reduction in open category COE supply.

As mentioned in the article too, open category COE are mostly used for large cars.

So my question is why, since there is only 2 or 0.29% increase in COE for large car and likely a (now: 701+485) - (past: 699+617) = -131 >> net decrease in COE for large cars, is the article titled "More COE for big cars"? Even without taking the small car COE demand and supply into consideration, does it give you the impression that COE has presumably increased?   

With the small car category in the picture, it will be (now: 701+485+786) - (past: 699+617+1239) = -583 >> net decrease in COE supplies for car. 

Why do they not just say 'Fewer COE for Cars in the next 6 months'? Isn't that more accurate?  

<<<<Update 13 July 2012: 9.25am>>>>

(Image Source: Today FB page)

Maybe the people at TODAY heard me yesterday, they ran a front page article this morning truly reflecting the COE situation. While print media in Singapore tend to be slightly bias, my kudos to TODAY Papers for its stand to being as objective as possible in its report.

Train Stations Display

(Photo credits to its owner)

I don't quite understand why SMRT (and SBST too) stations only have 2 Plasma / LCD display (which is visible but not particularly big) at the same position to show the next train arrival. It is usually at one side (not centre) of the platform.

Hence, from the other end of the station, even if the timing is displayed full sized on the screen, one will have to strain one's eye to roughly make sense of what it is displaying.

To make matters worse, probably due to revenue issues, SMRT have to put advertisements (usually movies trailers) on these screens and the timing size is reduced to a tiny font on top of the advertisement which is usually not visible to one of average eye sight 1 carriage away.

Why don't the train operators consider have an extra screen at the other end of the platform? With prices that every family can afford, these flat screen displays cannot be too expensive for the train operators to buy.

To go one step further, since there are so many 'gei gong' (useless) announcements, why don't we replace some useless ones with useful ones like
"The next South-bound train will arrive in 2 minutes", "East-bound train will arrive in approximately 3 minutes".

Won't that be more useful than all those current announcement?

And you can have all the advertisements on the screen you like.

Solving Public Transportation 2

My grandmother, who goes out once in a blue moon, commented that the train doors are like lift doors. 2 doors which slides open and a window at the top middle portion for each door.

To us who take MRT on a daily basis, it is just a vehicle that takes us to places. 

So when my grandma says the analogy, it really struck me hard!! 

IF the MRT is like a lift, then what we need to solve public transportation could be 

what would be like an escalator.  

Have you ever taken the lift at crowded buildings / places (e.g. Shopping Centres during weekends or even MRT station during peak hours). The process will be wait > Lift comes > See if you can get in>If Yes proceed, If No, wait for the next one> process repeats itself again

On the other hand, in the very same building, have you notice how efficient the escalator is? People just hop-on, you don't have to wait, it moves slowly but you are still progressing, before you know it, you reached the next level while the people at the lift is still waiting. The amazing thing is while the lift can carry 20 people in one trip, the escalator can carry 20 people constantly at any one moment.

So to solve the problem of overcrowding trains, will we be able to think of something which can be like an escalator? Well, human mind is infinite, so it is not a matter of whether we can or not, but how soon can we? 

Here's an interesting concept that I found on youtube to illustrate the concept. Of course, what needs to be improved is that there is still a limited space in the carriage, so waiting will still be a concern when the crowd builds up. What we should be looking at is something that will be able to flow continuously to a point where nobody need to wait.

Carriage that clips onto a non-stop train 

(Video rights to its owner)

But instead of a training coming to carry the carriage, maybe the track should keep on moving or something to move the carriage when it is ready to go on track. Then there should be plenty of carriages at each station to prepare for boarding. Carriages uses a third track to zoom back to the place where the crowds are (suburbs in the morning and city in the evening) once it reaches the terminal station.

Solving Public Transportation 1

Most of the time, during peak hours, you will notice a one-person-in-a-car situation. As the conventional car is now built to carry 5 people in the case of a saloon car, 4 or at least the 3 seats are the back are left un-utilised. So a more efficient form of transport would be a motorcycle, where it does not take up some much road space, it is able to squeeze in between the slow moving cars and it causes less pollution.

Yet in Singapore weather and traffic conditions, many would not want even consider that option, possibly due to these factors: 

a) Exposure to risk 1 - Rider is outside vehicle when the vehicle is in motion, thus more dangerous. (the talk about metal outside man and man outside metal)

b) Exposure to risk 2 - Non stability, more likely to fall, again more dangerous.

c) Heat - Motorbike, despite that it is much cheaper, has no air conditioner. And AC is important in Singapore weather.

A three wheeler motorbike (scooter) below is now in the market but it does not eliminate point (a) and (c) above.

So it is possible that we have a smaller car, that of a motorbike size, yet let the person be inside the car and have air conditioner. 

Consider this:

The above is the Peel P50, smallest production car in the world.  If you still cannot see how small it is, here is another picture： 

Manufacturers have been looking at alternatives as well, what they called Narrow Track Vehicles including Nissan Tandem, Renault Twizy, VW L1, VentureOne, etc..

Review of Renault Twizy： 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vJE929qyug

（They disabled embedding) 

3.5hours charge, 60 miles (100km)

Range 47 miles (75km)

Both above may not have doors or windows but if you look closer, it is a small enclosed space 

where with some innovation and research, I am sure that installing air con into these vehicle 

is not too difficult an issue. 

Things you may not know on COE and car ownerships

COE coupled together with import tax becomes a double 'tax' to all buyers. Additional Reg. Fee (or ARF) is 100% of open market value. So even before COE comes in, you are already paying double of what you should be paying. 

COE at $100k means you are paying $10k per year to the authorities. Five years ago, the only people who are paying $10k per year to the authorities are people who own and drives luxurious 5000cc or above cars. 

Singapore hot and humid weather condition contribute significantly to the decision of just sticking to the car no matter what. Because the car comes equipped with this amazing invention called AIR-CON. 

For the money spent A DAY on a $160k 2000cc car, say instalment + petrol + parking (55+20+5 = $80), 

you can: 

- Take public transport with the same amount of money for WHOLE work month based on $4 per day. 

- Dine in a decent restaurant, having decent buffet for 2 with the same amount of money,

- Treat at least 26 person to a $3 chicken rice in hawker centre

- Buy a low end printer or mobile phone, one month you can buy 30 phones or printers. 

- Take the whole family to Singapore flyer or other attractions

- Buy 240 packets of tissue paper from the 3 for $1 tissue auntie

- Feed a person (or family) in India for 66 days. (Not drive for 6 days, you can feed them for 1 year). Some people in India live on less than US$1 per day.

See the point. What's more, I am not talking about a high end high performance luxury or sports car. I am merely taking the figures from an average on-the0-road cars like Toyota Camry, Honda Accord, Nissan Cefiro which you see many on the roads everyday.

Comments on Sky High COE

I had been reading with much interest the suggestions that people are giving in contrast to the sky-high COE prices today.

As time of writing this post, COE for CAT B 1600cc and above is at $91,000, just marginally shy of the $100k market.

One common suggestion that stands out is the reduce / modify / or even abolish the entire COE system and transfer the cost from owning a car to using a car. That is cars should be priced according to market forces and they should be no government intervention (apart from the import tax) to deter people from buying the car.

However, once the owner of the car drives the car say into town, he/she will need more charges than the current charges now. And since they are paying less in installments, they have a choice of spending the money saved to drive into town or save the money and choose an alternative form of transport.

Thus the rationale should be that the person who parked his/her car most of the time in the carpark should pay the least while the person who drives everyday, especially into congested area should be made to pay the most.

If you observed that people are shunning ERPs for $2 or $3 per time they pass through the gantry, I don't see why a higher charge will not deter the average motorists to drive into town and contribute to congestion.

In Singapore, a $120k (inclusive of COE) Toyota Vios depreciates around $40 a day. Adding up other fixed cost like insurance and road tax to average out to be about $5 per day, making it about $45 a day. Isn't this one significant reason why people cannot not drive each day as whether one drive or not, the $45 is still incurred (obviously you need to pay more than $45 when you drive as the variable costs comes in)
For the same car, less than $60k COE,  it becomes $20 depreciation a day, $25 with all fixed cost, doesn't this figure make it more feasible for one to leave the car at home the whole day or just use the car at night with the option to use the car whenever necessary?

I think that making people give up driving is a far more effective idea than making people giving up their cars. To many, if not all, there will be some occasions where you will need to drive, such as Chinese New Year, Hari Raya, family gatherings, even just to drive out for suppers etc. As these events happen mainly on weekends and public holidays, out of the peak hours and peak areas, they hardly cause serious congestions.

Another good suggestion that I want to highlight here is to ballot for COE. The argument is that now with the sky high prices, it only allows the rich people to buy 2 or 3 cars while depriving the privileges to those whom really need a car: E.g.: Parents with children or people with elderly parents or people who need to fetch people who are not-so-mobile.

This way, it is a fairer system which does not deprive one of owning a car when you need it

Steep COE prices: Balloting fairer and cheaper

IN THE light of the unhappiness over soaring certificate of entitlement (COE) prices of late, I question the wisdom behind the system of car ownership in Singapore.

The stated purpose of COEs is to limit car ownership and, hence, ease traffic congestion. The outcome has struggled to match the goal.

The high COE prices indicate that the system influences who buys a car - those who can afford it - more than it limits car numbers.

This is obvious from the fact that the Government has to intervene by reducing the annual vehicle growth rate to 0.5 per cent come August, from 1.5 per cent currently and 3 per cent before 2009. ('COE prices up because economy is doing well, says Lui'; Monday)

The number of cars sold can at most match the number of COEs available, regardless of the COE price. This means it is unnecessary to have a price beyond an administrative fee required to run the system, which is meant to control car ownership and not generate revenue.

If important aspects like housing and education can be subject to balloting, surely a system can be designed to ballot for cars.

In hindsight, the unintended knock-on effect of high COE prices outweighs its limited success so far.

For the convenience of owning a car, the average family is saddled with a debt of tens of thousands of dollars - money that can improve its quality of life in many other ways.

Most people pay for their cars in instalments, reducing personal savings and spending power over several years.

If they were to divert a part of that money towards retail, education, health care and such, that would surely do Singapore a lot more good.

Chan Tau Chou

(Taken on straitstimes.com, published 19 Apr 2012)

My comments: 

I agree. I think it makes sense rather than people spending unnecessary money just to buy a piece of paper which depreciates. There are many ways to control vehicle population rather than just making people Pay and Pay (sounds familiar...).Deterrence should also be implemented to people who have access to more than one car (although I believe identifying them will not be easy)

Also found and extracted this below passage from www.tremeritus.com which the writer has, I believe, very accurately described the current situation: 

"The main problem with the COE system it allocates a scarce resource based on a person’s ability to pay rather than his needs. A middle income parent who has to ferry his children to school and take his parents to hospital can be out-bidded by a multi-millionaires’s son who uses the car for dates and clubbing. The disadvantage of such a system is it causes an ever widening gap of unfulfilled demand among those with the greatest need for a car. In Singapore, where the income gap is so wide, over time more and more COEs will just go the rich rather than people who need it."

Does it make sense?

Then TIBS Bendy Bus

(Taken from sgforums.com)

SMRT started operating their articulated bus 'Bendy Bus' in some of their services some 10 years ago and personally I think it is a very good move as being 1 and 1/2 times longer than normal bus, it can carry, yes, 1and 1/2 times more passengers.

Officially, a Bendy Bus (BB) can carry as many or even more passengers than a Double Decker (DD) than SBST uses, depending on the model. (DD - 132, BB - 143, Normal SD -85, 90 newer WAB models).

Depending on the service routes, where the passengers mostly travel long distance (some that I can think of including) 198, 30, 51, 857, 858, 969, etc, DD will be ideal as it provides more seating capacity.

On the other end of the spectrum, on those service routes where passengers travel no more than 5 bus stops or bus journey no more than 10 minutes, BB will be more ideal. The reasons are obvious. For routes with most of the passenger travels less than 5 bus stops, the lower deck of the DD may be packed but there is almost certain that there are empty seats on the upper deck, especially towards the rear. For the BB, almost anywhere in the bus in the same with easy access to exit doors and such, so it is more likely to reach the full capacity in such situation than a DD.

LTA will argue that despite that, it takes up more road space and road space is very limited in Singapore. So, I do believe that LTA has done is to limit the number of BB on the road.

Maybe I can suggest to LTA and the bus operators certain measures.

First, identify those routes that are people are traveling long distance and also the routes that has high number of passenger as well as a high turnover (likely most of them will be feeder routes)

Deploy all DD on those long distance routes,

For those routes that are out of town (e.g. feeder services) there should be no issue deploying BB. (Current situation now is that SMRT Buses are replacing the BB with WAB smaller capacity models)

For those routes that passes by town, moderate the BB (maybe every alternate trip), etc. BB bus services can stop at different bus stops so that it doesn't severely block the other buses. Another alternative can be to disallow BB to go into town.


The current situation now is that in the neighborhood that I lived in, the interchange operated by SMRT, I see many occurrence of a service route that require BB (bus is so full till the driver have a problem closing the front doors) is deprived of the BB whereas another service route which does not require BB(enough capacity to have just a few people standing) using the much needed BB.

And also, I hope LTA can allow more BB on the roads, especially in the neighborhood areas where it is really needed.

Move to the rear?

Published on TODAY papers, Friday, 17 Feb 2012, PP26

If you want people to move to the rear of the bus, install an additional door behind (see below). That's almost 100% sure people will move towards the rear.

Same bus model as the A22 that the SMRT is using. I don't see why not?