Re: On Sunday, private buses halted - MRT and buses will be full of Indian workers.
the Land Transport Authority (LTA) will be suspending on Sunday bus services which ferry foreign workers from their dormitories to Little India.
This involves two bus associations -- the Singapore School Transport Association and the Singapore School and Private Hire Bus Owners' Association -- which in total provide 25 bus services plying those routes.
Going forward, it will assess if there is a need to suspend or scale back these bus services.
LTA said it has bus and train services on standby to accommodate crowds that wish to travel to Little India this weekend.
- CNA/gn
This private bus services help LTA to solve the problems of ferrying these workers out of the dormitories on their day off. Take the example of the current riot incidence the private bus was taking the workers back to Terusan Lodge in Jalan Pappan, that is off Jalan Terusan.
You guys who is not familiar with that area, it is opposite the previous Tang Dynasty, where on both end across the Ahmad Ibrahim Expressway is an overhead bridge, opposite site link to where Jurong Bowl used to be etc & leads into Taman Jurong. This side of the expressway, there is small road that leads to Jalan terusan & then Jalan Pappan, everyday you see streams of workers coming in & out of that road. There are empty containers being housed there & that area used to be THE JURONG BUS INTERCHANGE...SPH Print centre is there.
There is a bus stop along Jln Ahmad Ibrahim (expressway) that provide bus service to Taman Jurong & then to Lakeside MRT Station, the bus stop just out of Jalan Terusan brings you to Taman Jurong. I have tried walking from Jalan Pappan out to Jalan Ahmad Ibrahim & have used the two bus stops opposite each other in both directions, even the bus stop taking bus to Taman Jurong.
The private buses will take these workers to Jurong Point & drop off, either at where the taxi stand UOB Bank is, or the back, where there is another taxi stand..for $1 or maybe it is $2 now..& from there it hits AYE all the way by the expressway to Hampshire Rd/Race Course Road..
I have traveled in them buses before, not only from Terusan Area, other parts of the Jurong areas, Benoi, Pioneer, Tuas, the olf Jurong Industrial Area & many other areas..
I am sure that LTA is aware of the congestion, assembly of large volume of people at any one time during the eve of public holidays, religious festivals, weekends on Saturday night, Sunday morning & Sunday night.
The biggest congestion would be the night of the holidays, & on Sunday night where the workers arrive in droves & leave in droves. When you alight at the place I had mentioned...you are taken back to time...like you are arriving in a place 'out of Africa'....people jay walk everywhere, buses stream in & out & you have to dodge them as well as the people on the road etc.. Then on Sunday nights or Saturday nights, those going back to their dormitories have to find the particular bus that bring them to their respective dormitories, they miss that bus...they have to go back on their own...& if you are staying at Terusan Lodge, Jalan Pappan, off Jur Port Rd..JURONG..gourd help you.
There is no proper embarking & disembarking point in Tekka area to handle the large numbers of private buses ferrying in & out of workers to that place. The arrangement is a mess...
The planner have to look into this, not only Tekka, but other areas too..where there are concentration of foreign workers...blue collared ones & even white collared ones....especially where Alcohol are involved..
Was our planning good enough? emergency measures good enough...or have they listen enough to the ground...?? & whom did you vote??
