Young Singaporean still want to own cars

Read:

https://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/young-singaporeans-still-want-own-160000929.html

The article talk about 1) poor public transport reputation, 2) comfort of not using a car 3) financial "im-savviability"


Efficiency is probably the basic need of transportation. People thinking (especially going to work in the morning) are that "I dont care what I am in as long as it get me to work on time" mentality. MRT, Bus, Car, bicycle - anything that can get me to work on time, secondary-ly anything that can delay me from leaving the house (yet get me to work on time), anything that reduce my time travelling is a good, preferred mode of transport.

The train conceptually is a good concept for the above points, especially for those living far from their work place. Get on the train and it usually takes you to your destination in 30 to 45 mins. Your journey is limited to this timing only if you are living one of the train stations and your work place is also at another train station (that is to say almost zero travelling time from station to workplace).

Unfortunately, most people live 1-3km away from the nearest train station and hence they have the following choices to get to the train station before the 30 to 45 mins ride.

• Take a bus from their house to the train station (most common)
• Taxi / Uber / Grab to the train station (most comfortable)
• Walk to the train station (if not too far)
• (Electronic) cycle / scooter / hoverboard / skateboard to the train station (getting increasing common) 
• Drive to the train station (probably most costly if parking cost is included)
• Get a family member or friend to drop you at the train station  

The first choice of taking a bus is most common because of its relatively low, almost zero cost. However, you run a risk of waiting longer (compared to the other options) especially when the buses are not on schedule or when the buses are too crowded and you are not able to board the bus. The same waiting time applies to the taxis when you try to flag one along the road.

The last 4 options eliminates the waiting time and is something that i want to talk about more in details, linking us back to the article of why young Singaporean still want to own cars.

First, walking.  Well, if you don't mind a bit of exercise, dont mind sweating, don't mind using some energy early in the morning and your house is not too far from the train station, it is good choice for you. However, most of us are wearing our formal attires (shirts, pants, skirts, blouse) and its probably not a good idea to get any of these attire wet first thing in the morning before we start work. A car will be good, even if I were to drive it and park at the mrt station)

Really? If you have a car, will you just drive to the MRT station and squeeze in the train to work? What about the distance from the station to the office? Will you want to get yourself wet from sweat at the time you step into office? So...(its obvious which you will choose)

I know at this point, some may argue about the cost of driving (petrol, erp, parking) on top of cost of owning the car. This is especially so when the you work right in town and start work at the end of the peak hour (9am). Peak hour slow traffic, ERP at the highest rates...not to mention the sky high parking charges you pay per day or per month.

Of course, if money is not an issue to you, the only thing that you need to endure is the peak hour slow moving traffic. In fact, you would suddenly wish that ERP charges are higher than the already high charge so that people will avoid the ERP gantry and hence not be driving beside you.  To these people whose money is 'unlimited', life is always great in Singapore. Tell you what, you should get a chauffeur to drive your Rolls Royce and eliminates the stress of driving too.

For the average man on the street, its moving back to re-exploring the choices.

Alas, we are left with 1 option: E-cycle / scooter / xxx-boards to the station.  Its seems to be a great idea because being electronic, these scooters or bicycles doesn't require must effort to keep it moving and its moves relatively quickly compared to walking. You reach the station in less than half the time compared to if you walk, probably uses much less energy and there is not waiting time involved. The scooters (not the bicycles) can also be taken along with you to continue the journey when you alight from the train. Can see why this is getting increasing popular with the layman.

However, as its is not a car, it is still subjected to the elements of the weather and you could also be stuck behind a slow moving pedestrian trying to occupy the whole pedestrian path. And the e-vehicle are good for the last kilometre (mile) commuting, not the whole journey. And you face the same problems of all other train commuters too. Train breakdown, not able to board the train, squeezing like sardines, just to name a few.

Hence, from the above discussion, the group of people who has the least inconvenience is not someone with an e-scooter, but someone with a car (and chauffeur) and with money not an issue for him / her. It's an aspiration of the best and young people are working towards it.

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.

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."