For Gurmit, Public Transport is Still a Drag

By Elizabeth John

IF there is one person who has walked his talk on public transport, its Malaysia’s best known environmentalist, Gurmit Singh.

In 1978, the executive director of the Centre for Environment, Technology and Development sold his Fiat 124ST and has soldiered along since then.

Part of the reason was cost, says Gurmit, who was then a struggling consultant. The greater reason, of course, was living the life he preached about.

He has been able to prove that reliance on a private vehicle is expensive and not necessary, but admits it has not made for an easy life.

With only public transport as an option for the last 28 years, Gurmit has a great deal to say about getting around in the Klang Valley and most comments aren’t complementary.

Bus drivers who don’t keep to the timetable, poorly maintained buses and trains, decision makers who do not use public transport, a lack of information and bad city planning are among his many grouses.

Other failures he points to include bus lanes that have not speeded up bus travel, LRTs that are sometimes impossible to get to and public transport planners who determine bus routes without understanding the situation on the ground.

He has had to walk from Brickfields back to his house in SS2, Petaling Jaya late one night after public transport came to a halt and taxis refused to charge by the meter. He has also had to walk out from a hotel in Putrajaya along the main road, before he was able to hail a taxi to get him home.

He shakes his head in bewilderment at the memory of paying just RM2 for a commuter train ride and subsequently RM5 for a taxi ride from the station to a destination less than a kilometre away.

He does not understand why he has to leave his home at 7.30am to be on time for a 9.30am meeting at Putrajaya.

We repeat past mistakes and fail to learn from those others have made, says Gurmit. Just look at the STAR, PUTRA and Monorail trains. Parts of one system cannot be used for another in the event of a breakdown – not the coaches, signalling system or the spare parts, and that is an absolute waste.

“If we continue to waste and make mistakes like this, it is questionable if we can ever solve the problems facing public transport. Now the Government talks of spending billions on public transport. Where will the money go?

“Towards addressing underlying issues or more new hardware that is not interchangeable?”

Where is the communication between the planners, developers, the Commercial Vehicles Licensing Board and public transport providers, he asks.

“There is planning for new townships but it never includes public transport.,”

The compulsion to create a better, more seamless and hassle free public transport system should come from Cetdem’s 2004-2005 study of energy use in households.

They discoveredthat between 68 and 70 per cent of energy used in a household can be attributed to the petrol that fuels private cars.

In comparison, only 25 to 30 per cent of a household’s energy use was attributed to electricity used mainly for air-conditioning and refrigeration. The study covered 300 urban areas.

These are figures worth thinking about in any country trying to reduce its petroleum bill, says Gurmit.

He says things haven’t changed, partly because the majority of public transport users are the lower and lower-middle income groups who do not have a voice.

When more of the middle-class join the “sweaty crowd” on buses and trains and make their dissatisfaction heard, things may finally move, says Gurmit.

* eliz@nst.com.my