By : Minderjeet Kaur
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KUALA LUMPUR: The professionals are ready to take public transport to work but the infrastructure and the services are just not ready to support their move.
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| Prof Rehan Karim says the public transportation industry is moving in the right direction. |
Public transport expert Prof Rehan Karim says he sees a change in perception among professionals, especially after the fuel price hike two weeks ago.
"There seems to be a shift. We never thought it would be possible to change their perception. But it has happened," said the Universiti Malaya lecturer on transport.
Three years ago, Rehan carried out research that showed only 16 out of 100 people in Klang Valley used public transport. The low demand was due to public transport being slow and unintegrated.
Rehan recently took a rail service to city centre. However, he had to wait 45 minutes as the carriages were full. It took him another hour to travel home.
But he said the public transport industry was now moving in the right direction, especially after the setting up of a commission to act as an umbrella body.
He said Klang Valley folk could not expect the changes overnight as it would take time to see results.
He suggested that more park and ride areas be built to allow motorists to park on the outskirts of the city and catch a train.
He also recommended multi-level car parks to be built at KTMB stations which lacked ground parking space such as the Subang Jaya station.
Another public transport expert, Assoc Prof Sabariah Jamali, hopes the commission will look at public transport as a public service.
"It involves the public. Therefore, all its operations should be defined by public needs."
She suggested that routes that were less in demand be run by the government to ensure bus operators did not increase fares.
"The government should review the entire public transportation system or they might make too many mistakes before we get it right."
She also suggested that bus operators pay minimal toll charges so as to divert the money to the maintenance of their vehicles.
She also hoped the commission would not make ad hoc decisions but rather have a long-term plan, collect data and carry out analysis before a decision was made.
Sabariah also supports congestion charges on vehicles entering the city during peak hours to improve the air quality.
Other suggestions put forward are improving bus shelters, covered pedestrian walkways, more buses to reduce waiting time, and proper information boards for buses.
Currently, about 700,000 people use the RapidKL bus and rail services, while another 90,000 passengers use the KTM Komuter daily.
However, about 1.5 million people still choose to drive to the city centre daily due to poor public transport services.
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