LTA announced a one year trial run to give free train rides to commuters whose workplace locations are in the central area, provided they clock in before 8am.
Recently, PAP's Ms Josephine Teo announced that they will extend the train service to 1 year and this time, they will target the employers instead.
Apparently, they received feedback from employees that they don't mind starting work early but their bosses are unable to change their mindset.
This scheme has been wrong in the first place. It looks good on paper but nothing practical
This scheme started last year. Until now, I still experience a lot of congestion on the trains
This is a classic example of how PAP is out of touch with commoner's problems.
Common sense will tell you that giving free train rides will not result in a reduction in congestion. The problem lies with the bosses who refuse to start their work early but PAP thinks that by giving free money to employees, they can solve the problem.
PAP should have thought about this from this angle way before they even launched it last year but they just bull-dozed their way through.
Below are some of the reasons to explain this policy failure.
1) Some bosses have insecurity issues and will dump you work in the afternoon and expect you to stay back late to make sure you complete it on that day. My previous boss doesn't believe in going home early as it is a sign that you are lazy. Most of us have to work as late as 8pm to pretend to look and act busy. We hardly have any motivation to start work early unless the boss starts the ball rolling first.
2) Most of our work need teamwork to get things done. In my current work, I rely on finance, marketing and logistics to get my work done. Even if I start work early, many of my colleagues do not and I cannot get my work done without their input. Unless all of us start work early, it might be a possibility.
3) Most of us do not have a choice in the location of our work. I read one URA press release which says they hope to decentralise the central region and move government buildings such as LTA, MND, BCA, NEA, WDA and PUB from central CBD to Jurong (near Jem, IMM) and hopefully reduce human congestion and traffic.
But the fact is, HR employers don't hire people based on where they work or stay. They usually hire people based on your experience, qualifications and academics. I have attempted to join NEA, WDA, PUB or MND but the competition for these jobs is very intense.
I stay in Jurong but yet, I have to travel to the East to work. In the end, the trains are still as crowded as before. In fact, when I take the early morning train at 6am, there were many employees who also travelled from Jurong to Changi and quite a lot of them work in Changi Business Park.
So I urge Ms Josephine Teo. Stop this free train rides now and stop wasting our taxpayers money. This staggered hours timing has been tried and tested before in the 1970s when Singapore implemented the Restricted Licensing Scheme (RLS) in CBD. It failed to take off.
You are completely out of touch.
CJ
TRS Contributor