Parchiao said:Like the rate and magnitude of increase in fares, the quality of service has improved at a similar rate. Everyone also forgets that profit making routes or stops have to compensate for loss making routes or stops. And if you wait for a bus with 15 minuters intervals and complain, that only makes you a very impatient person. Frequency of buses arriving at any stop depends largely on the traffic conditions of the road that the bus takes before it reaches that stop, it is not much different if you take a taxi or drive your own car. You complain about this, it means you have not given it much thought.
The point is not about waiting for 15 minutes or whether i am patient or not. The point is since the various hikes from the pass few years, what have actually improve in terms of bus and mrt support? Are the improvements what commuters need? As for the magnitude, do we have to have a hike of $1 to see quality really improve? I have also pointed out that the revenue models for the companies has also increased, ie increasing of rental space at mrt station, advertisement on tv mobile, etc. So where does all this increase in revenue goes to? Ultimately the whole issue lies in how does PTC approve or disapprove the hike, and upon approving what sort of improvement can be request from the transport company. Even the public make noise, it can be seem that it does not affect the overall decision of the PTC at all. So what type of checks are there in place to ensure PTC does it job and fare hikes are justifable, or are they simply increasing just because they can? So in my personal point of view, improvement in transport service is how i justfy a fare hike. An increment in bus interval frequency is how i choose to measure an improvement in the transport service. Valid or not, i believe that is what most commuter who like to have. One might argue that operating cost increase as well therefore the hike. This i will agree if the company is doing only ok and profits are thin, however this is not the situation for the transport companies here.
As for salary increment of workers, etc. A better way to achieve it is through better management, investment, new revenue sources, etc and not mainly by fare hike.
Just some of my thoughts