SMRT

[sgd]

Did you guys see the taxi "income opportunity" broadcast?


[Image: ftet4e3.jpg]

It's one thing to make money but I think this is done in very bad taste, this is like taking advantage of other's misfortune not how I'd expect company like SMRT to behave, makes outsiders and foreigners see us as backward third world country.

in some ways the government brought this upon themselves so they only have themselves to blame for this bad publicity.

[FA+TA]

CNA
NS-EW MRT lines to start 10am on Sunday  
Posted : 17 Dec 2011 1606 hrs   
MRT service on Sunday for the North-South and East-West lines will start later - at 10am instead of 5.30am - after checks have been completed on all trains and tracks.

Note:
Minister is on site today.

[touzi]

Do we have a national disaster recovery / business continuity plan ? I know this is not exactly a disaster, but gahmen should have plans to tackle a breakdown in the nation's transport system. Couldn't the SAF mobilize its resources to alleviate the situation? To express disappointment and hold SMRT management accountable is just not good enough, gahmen should play a bigger role in helping to manage the actual chaos. As a society we did not fare too well in this test.

As for penalty, instead of imposing a fine, SMRT should be asked to provide free service for a day ( sorry shareholders ! ).

[weijian]

As for penalty, instead of imposing a fine, SMRT should be asked to provide free service for a day ( sorry shareholders ! ).

This reminds me that M1 recently had something similar as well...

As a shareholder with SMRT, i hv to agree with this. With the consecutive breakdowns, bad publicity and more importantly, folks who are frustrated with the overloaded public transport system demanding payback, i believe we could do with some goodwill by giving a 'free MRT ride' day on a busy Saturday or Sunday - better still, make it on this coming Christmas...HO HO HO..

[wsreader]

Free service day only benefit passengers but no money flow into the gahmen coffer. What is the chance of it happening?

Although the breakdown occur at the SMRT stations, information on the scope of the service disruption should be passed to SBS too, so that passengers entering via the NE line can plan for their journey if part of their journey involve the affected stations. In addition, were the ntuc/sbs taxi drivers also informed of the "income opportunity" so as to help alleviate the situation of long taxi queues outside affected stations (of course using the correct message template)? A "whole of transport system" approach should be adopted to manage the chaotic situation and not just quick to mention penalty. In other words, when the service disruption is beyond a certain scale, the authority should play a bigger role like what touzi had written.

[sgd]

The transportation system they built for a population of 3-4 million but has to now serve 6 million people and more in future go figure why there's so much traffic jams crush loads on bus and trains and now service breakdowns.

[Musicwhiz]

The Straits Times
Dec 18, 2011
PM orders inquiry as trains break down again
North-South Line disrupted for 7 hours; LTA orders thorough visual check for 2 lines

By Ignatius Low

The Government will commission a formal Committee of Inquiry to look into the troubling spate of SMRT breakdowns, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong yesterday.

The move comes as SMRT's North-South Line broke down again for seven hours yesterday morning, affecting 94,000 commuters heading into town on the last weekend before Christmas.

This was the second major disruption on the North-South Line in less than 36 hours, prompting the Land Transport Authority (LTA) to order an unprecedented shutdown of two SMRT lines for a thorough visual check of all trains and tracks.

As a result, the North-South and East-West lines will be open to commuters at 10 this morning, much later than their usual 5.30am start time. About 250 buses will provide free parallel services between the stations on both lines until the trains start rolling.

Yesterday's disruption started at 6.50am, eventually knocking out train travel in both directions between Marina Bay and Ang Mo Kio.

Northbound services resumed at about 9am, but southbound services were only gradually restored throughout the morning, regaining normal state at 1.48pm.

LTA and SMRT said that yesterday's breakdown had the same root cause as Thursday's - a misalignment between the track and the 'collector shoes' on the trains that draw power from it.

This time, it was two faulty sections of the track near Orchard station that caused as many as seven trains to stall.

Several trains had to be towed out of the tunnels and about 500 passengers had to disembark from their stalled train and walk 150m through the tunnel to Somerset station.

'Had it just been a one-off matter and then the matter is solved, then I think the operating agencies can take care of it,' said PM Lee, who is officially on leave but returned to LTA's headquarters yesterday afternoon to be briefed on the situation.

'But when the incidents happened again this morning, and the same thing, that meant that it wasn't a random thing. There's something more basic which has caused it and which we haven't quite pinned down yet.'

This is why the Government will appoint a Committee of Inquiry, which will study and publicly present evidence as to why the disruptions happened and how to make the system more robust and reliable, he said. It will be appointed within 'a couple of weeks'.

A Committee of Inquiry is a high-level probe typically chaired by a judge. In recent times, such committees were set up to look into the Nicoll Highway collapse and the escape of the terrorist Mas Selamat Kastari.

'We are taking it very seriously. I think public safety is an absolute,' said Mr Lee. But he also noted that the recent breakdowns were not primarily a safety issue.

'We are not talking about trains derailing or colliding with one another,' he said. 'It's an issue of operation, of providing the service without interruption or mishap. And I think given a bit of time, we will be able to solve it.'

Mr Lee also touched on criticisms that SMRT failed to give timely information to commuters about the breakdown, saying that it is something that LTA and SMRT will have to discuss and improve.

'The immediate concern will be with the people who are affected, the passengers who are in the trains who are trapped,' he said.

'And you have to let them know: Please wait or please walk, which do you want them to do?'

Minister for Transport Lui Tuck Yew paid a personal visit to the Toa Payoh, Newton and City Hall stations yesterday to see for himself whether SMRT had improved communications and crowd control procedures since Thursday night's breakdown.

'Overall, my personal impression today compared to what I read on Thursday when I was in Cambodia was that there is some improvement,' he said at a press conference in the afternoon.

The train operator stepped up the frequency of its announcements yesterday and recalled more staff - clad in easily identifiable yellow vests - to assist commuters at affected stations.

'SMRT has obviously taken on board some of the lessons that it learnt from the initial incident,' said Mr Lui. 'It has given better and more timely information, although I would say there is still some way to go.'

ignatius@sph.com.sg

[d.o.g.]

My personal view of this mess is that it is one of the expected outcomes of having a private monopoly operator - prices are too high and service levels are too low.

As with investing I think the solution is simple to understand but not easy to implement:

1. Rationalize the transport network so that there is ONE train operator and ONE bus operator;
2. Allow the train and bus operators to compete fully i.e. run parallel routes
3. Fares can be freely reduced but increases must be approved by the regulator
4. Fare increases cannot allow operator returns (as measured by ROIC) to exceed a preset level i.e. fare increases can only recover costs, to make more money beyond the cap they have to be more efficient

#1 and #2 are the key steps. LTA has to realize that we currently have 2 local monopolies and neither is doing a really good job. A ruling that SMRT must take over NEL and SBS must take over SMRT buses, with the valuation difference to be determined by an independent assessor and paid accordingly, would go a long way towards solving our current problems in the long run.

Once the buses compete fully against the trains we will have some important outcomes:

1. Competition

a. Trains run more frequently and break down less
b. The system will have extra capacity (train + bus) and reduced crowding

2. Redundancy

a. Built-in backup system when either the trains or buses have problems

3. Cars

a. Less incentive to buy cars = lower COEs and better driving conditions

Of course, there will be the usual protests about regulatory interference in the free market etc. But I think the welfare of 5.5 million Singapore residents (or at least the 3m citizens if you don't care about non-citizens) come before the 52,000 SMRT shareholders and the 21,000 SBS shareholders.

Just my $0.02.

[rafflesplaceguy]

I think the recent awarding of downtown line operating contract to SBS Transit provides an indication to the future land transport landscape:

- The trains are owned by LTA but SBS pays for the operating rights for X number of years.
- LTA has taken over the planning of bus routes from the two bus operators.
- I think the recent new busses added on the roads are owned by LTA? And the new train purchases that was recently announced will also be owned by LTA?

In time to come, I think LTA will own all the train and bus assets while SBS, SMRT and maybe other operators will bid (and pay) for the right to operate the different MRT lines and bus routes?

By then, am not sure how this will impact the fare structure in the future. Perhaps the operators will be free to set fares but subject to caps imposed by LTA?

[pianist]

i am not sure if buses can compete well with trains..
if sbs is to purely operate bus and smrt is to purely train, then the obvious winner seems to be smrt which recent events have proved that it is not a reliable train operator