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IT SEEMS obvious by now that the Government's handling of housing issues has been the most successful of several outstanding policy issues. At least, this is going by the results of a recent Straits Times survey on key election issues and their progress since the 2011 General Election. By contrast, government policies on transport issues have yet to resonate. What factors have led to the success in housing policy? What lessons can be applied to transport issues? Three points come to mind. They are: Targeting different social groups more carefully, being relevant, and implementing policies that the targeted groups can readily understand and appreciate. The challenge is to fine-tune policies to meet the needs of different groups more closely. For housing, the different groups included the first-time flat seeker, the sandwiched middle class, singles, and marginalised groups such as single mothers and divorcees with children. For first-time flat seekers, for whom a backlog had already built up, focused policies included building a record number of flats. The move was so successful that within three years, a balance was restored. The average application rate for Build-To-Order (BTO) flats fell from 5.3 per applicant in 2010 to a low of 2.9. A special subsidy was provided for households earning $2,250 or less, with eligible buyers limited to two-room or three-room flats. The Government also expanded its Special Housing Grants to households earning less than $6,500 a month. Applicants could opt for a four-room flat and still qualify for up to $20,000 more in subsidies. There was also the slew of policies related to the rental market, which made it accessible to a wider range of households (and not just lower-income groups). Competition for flats from permanent residents was reduced by making the latter wait for three years after getting their residency. Citizens felt good that they had been given priority. The Housing Board also de-linked new-flat prices from those of resale flats to stabilise BTO flat prices. There was a concerted effort to address the cash-over-valuation component. This was removed completely in the resale market. The move was particularly helpful for young couples, who could take only smaller loans and found it difficult to pay out additional cash. All these measures were announced in quick succession. The cooler market that resulted helped meet citizen expectations. Each group felt attended to, and that created a feel-good, positive attitude. But what about the transport sector? Here, commuters are challenged by overcrowded trains and buses. There is intense competition for road space among cars, buses, taxis, bicycles and pedestrians. Vehicle owners are frustrated with the prices of certificates of entitlement (COEs), which vary with market forces and the growth of the car population. Public anger is compounded when public-listed transport companies report profits, while overcrowding, rail breakdowns and delayed buses are the norm. To be fair, the Government has taken action to improve the situation. It announced several concessions for commuters. Plans are on track to have more trains and to build more lines. Bus commuters will enjoy the $1.1 billion Bus Service Enhancement Programme and efforts to make bus services more regular. For car owners, there will be a review of the carbon emissions-based vehicle scheme. Cyclists will see more bicycle racks to secure 3,000 bicycles at 32 MRT stations. Pedestrians can enjoy more sheltered linkways and lifts at 40 pedestrian overhead bridges. And yet, these excellent, far-reaching policies have made little impression on the public. Why? I believe that unlike in housing, where each measure can be seen to be directly linked to a specific group, transport measures have appeared piecemeal. Transport policymakers must clearly define the various groups they need to address and formulate policies to help each group. Policymakers also need to explain how each set of changes will improve the lot of the various commuters or motorists involved. Take one category of disgruntled commuters: Those who travel by taxi. They want changes to work in their favour immediately. Taxi charges in Singapore are among the most complicated in the world. Surcharges often lead to unintended consequences. The midnight surcharge has led to taxis "disappearing" close to midnight. Surcharges and electronic road pricing charges have kept taxis from the Central Business District, where they are most needed, especially during peak periods. And yet, cabbies complain that they often cruise with their cabs empty. In fact, a solution is nigh. Why not allow and promote the usage of mobile phone taxi-booking apps? Taxi apps offered by third parties like GrabTaxi, Easy Taxi, MoobiTaxi and Uber match cabbies directly with commuters. These apps may appear to be disruptive technology from the point of view of existing taxi companies, which have invested heavily in their call centres. But they cater to taxi commuters' needs. Then, there are public transport commuters. One segment that has been marginalised due to accessibility or high fares are the lower-income, the disabled, the elderly and students. The Government has identified this segment as needing help, and has set aside about $50 million a year for fare concessions. But are these measures enough? Besides incremental gains, there should be transformational policies to bring about the tipping point that was seen in the housing issues. Look for a nexus that resonates. For example, why not use money collected from COEs to support bus and train commuters, and to help meet the needs of special groups like the elderly, students and the disabled? COE quota premiums are a relatively stable source of revenue. For buses, why not allow more private operators like City Direct to operate bus services, to compete with the existing transport companies? Building on the growing public acceptance of transport improvements and concessions, look seriously at structural issues to bring on the kudos from commuters. For now, the policy initiatives have yet to come together in a more impactful way to resonate with people. -- ST FILE PHOTO by Basskaran Nair The writer, a retired public relations professional, teaches media and public policy at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore.

EXCITEMENT is high over the proposed Malaysia-Singapore high- speed railway (HSR). But first, significant hurdles need to be overcome. The two countries must decide on pressing fundamentals. These include the ownership, financing and operating models, as well as the project structure. Then come decisions such as route alignment, number and location of stations along the way, form and location of checkpoint, and finally, location of depot and terminal stations. Terminal stations should ideally be in the two city centres, as it would provide the best accessibility to travellers. But this may not be technically feasible or cost-effective, as both city centres are highly built up. Already, Malaysia has identified Sungai Besi, a location 15km from the Petronas Twin Towers, as a site. That would be about the same distance that Jurong East (a location that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong seems to favour) is from Singapore's Central Business District. If the two terminals are in Sungai Besi and Jurong East, a door-to-door commute by HSR is projected to be 190 minutes - still considerably faster than 255 minutes by air. But these are details to be ironed out further down the line. First and foremost, the two governments must be convinced that an HSR will be equally beneficial to both Singaporeans and Malaysians for generations to come. And they must have the political will to see the project through. Indeed, besides financial capability, it is political will that is powering China's HSR programme. For cross-border projects, it was the political will of the Margaret Thatcher and Francois Mitterrand administrations that paved the way for the London-Paris HSR. If Thatcher and Mitterrand could get the English and French to work together, despite the two countries' legacy of bitter rivalry, there is Hope yet for the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore HSR. It is a project the two sides have been mulling for 20 years now. If it gets off the ground, it could potentially form the first leg of a South-east Asian network that links all the way up to China. A look at the history of HSRs across the globe shows that worldwide, they do not seem to have a strong or clear proposition for many countries. Ever since the first line started running in Japan 50 years ago, only 15 other countries have followed suit with their own systems. In comparison, 126 metro systems were built in 50 countries over the same period. But once overcome, the benefits are many. Initial obstacles ONE of the main impediments to HSR projects is cost. And because of the protracted nature of such projects, and their long gestation, cost overruns are also common. For instance, the London-Paris line was projected to cost £1 billion when the two countries agreed to build it in 1986. By the time it was fully opened in 2007, the bill had escalated to £11 billion, according to a report by The Telegraph. Land acquisition and environmental concerns (mainly noise pollution) are two other hurdles to HSR projects. Often, the latter cannot be overcome by going underground because of prohibitive cost. But even if a line does go underground - as in the case of the proposed Tokyo-Nagoya maglev project, through a mountain range - it will still raise the ire of environmentalists. The fringe benefits of an HSR project are not as apparent as those of a metro line, either. Property prices along the line seldom appreciate. In fact, they are liable to do the opposite. Reports by British realtors indicate that home prices near a new line from London to Manchester have already fallen by 40 per cent - even though the first trains are not expected to run till 2026. Yet, whenever a HSR line is finally built, it proves its worth fairly quickly. Faster, green commute HSR provides a fast, smooth, safe and clean commute. In a study of fatalities per billion passenger-km operated, the National Society of French Railways found HSR to be significantly safer than travel by air, road and conventional rail. It is also the greenest. The study found that HSRs in Europe emit only 12g of CO2 per passenger, versus 30g for buses, 115g for cars and 153g for airlines. (France's HSR system supposedly emits only 2.2g of carbon per passenger - because electricity there is largely nuclear.) Train tickets are also generally cheaper than airfares, and often, trains are faster door-to-door than planes. The Chinese example AND there is no better place to witness the rising popularity of HSR than in China, which has the largest HSR network at 10,000km - nearly half of the world's combined network. And it is an impressive network, too. When I took an HSR from Guangzhou to Wuhan in mid-2011, I was surprised by how luxurious it was. The seats and legroom were comparable to Business Class on a premium carrier. And even at 330kmh (this was just before the speed curbs following a fatal accident later in the year), it was as quiet and vibration-free as an A-380 plane. In fact, I found it to be slightly more comfortable than Japan's Shinkansen, and far better than France's TGV. I had commented to China Railway Corp officials how expansive the Guangzhou South train station was (bigger than some international airport terminals), and how sparsely occupied the trains were. But I was assured that both would be filled soon. Indeed, HSR is hot in China today. So much so that airlines are feeling the heat. According to a World Bank report in 2012, within three years of operation, China's HSR had adversely affected domestic airlines. "Some short-distance air services have been completely withdrawn... routes from Zhengzhou to Xian and from Wuhan to Nanjing both survived only a few months after the opening of HSR," it read. Air travel demand between Changsha and Guangzhou, a distance of about 600km, has fallen from about 90,000 passengers a month to 30,000. Airline profits have also plunged, even in cases when actual passenger volume has increased. China Air for instance, posted a 32 per cent drop in earnings last year to 3.26 billion yuan (S$656 million) - despite a 0.4-point improvement in load factor to 80.8 per cent. HSR ridership is still growing, with the state adding more trains and building new lines. According to a forecast reported in The New York Times, China's HSR network will carry more passengers per annum than the 54 million carried by US domestic airliners by this year. The only question mark hanging over China's HSR success story is profitability, and how long it will take to recoup the hundreds of billions in sunk cost. In fact, this was one reason why the World Bank said it was "cautiously optimistic" about the future of HSR in China. But the Chinese do not seem overly concerned. To the government, it is too early to talk about financial payback. Instead, it is pushing ahead with expansion plans, both in terms of increasing the capacity of its current system to cater to growing demand, and expanding the network. Changsha station for instance, will soon have 32 platforms - double today's 16. And it is all of four years old. It is also said to be aiming to build another 15,000km of lines by 2020 - some to join up with lines in neighbouring countries such as Laos, Vietnam and Myanmar. China to Singapore by rail? LAST October , Chinese Premier Li Keqiang opened an exhibition in Bangkok with Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra promoting a high-speed railway that would link China, Thailand and Singapore. The proposed line would be able to carry passengers from Kunming in China to Singapore in less than 12 hours, reported China Central Television. If this comes about, the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore HSR that PM Lee and his Malaysian counterpart, Datuk Seri Najib Razak, aim to build by 2020 may become the first leg of a South-east Asian network. The story does not stop there. Professor Wang Mengshu, a rail expert at the Chinese Academy of Engineering, was quoted in 2010 as saying that China was exploring HSR links all the way to Europe. If so, a traveller here could reach London by rail in under two days. That is, going by today's HSR capabilities. China is working on much higher speeds. It is home to the world's only commercial magnetic-levitation (maglev) system. The 30km line takes passengers from downtown Shanghai to Pudong International Airport (30km) in seven minutes, reaching a top speed of 431kmh. (I took a ride on it in 2005, and it was like flying at ground level.) Japan has conducted test runs of its new maglev trains, reaching close to 500kmh. And China is said to be testing a "Vactrain" - a maglev in an enclosed vacuum tunnel - capable of 1,000kmh. If these come about, one could commute from Singapore to London by train in 15-16 hours (including stops) - faster than a door-to-door commute by air (17-18 hours) today. That is unlikely to happen in the near future. But 400-500kmh trains are conceivable, even without maglev technology. It is therefore wise for builders of new lines to take this into consideration - to ensure that the tracks, power lines and signalling systems are capable of handling such speeds, or can be scaled up to do so. But even before Singapore and Malaysia get to discuss such technical issues, they have to overcome the initial hump: Get over the barriers of high cost and environmental concerns, manage public expectations, and demonstrate clear political will to turn the Malaysia-Singapore HSR from rhetoric into reality.

Events in recent years have underscored the need for Singapore to ramp up its transport infrastructure, as well as to rejuvenate what has already been built. Overcrowded trains and buses, long and unpredictable waiting times, and glitches in the rail system have been top grouses since as early as 2004. It did not help that Singapore's population grew by more than 30 per cent in the last decade to hit 5.4 million last year. Public transport ridership soared by more than 50 per cent over the same period to 6.36 million trips a day. Meanwhile, two major rail breakdowns in December 2011 brought into sharp focus the need for infrastructural upkeep on the back of fast-rising usage demand. The Government has responded fairly swiftly. But experts say a sustainable solution to managing public transport demand also needs measures such as increasing flexi-work arrangements, telecommuting or decentralised office hubs. On the capacity front, the Government is setting aside an estimated $2 billion to replace ageing parts in all the major rail lines together with rail operators. It is also in the process of rolling out a bus service enhancement programme - likely to cost in excess of $1.1 billion - which will boost fleet size by 20 per cent. And in January last year, it announced a slew of new lines that will grow Singapore's rail network to 360km - double its current length. This is on top of $60 billion of investments in place for ongoing projects such as the Downtown and Thomson lines. In all, transport-related projects may cost more than $150 billion. This is more than 40 per cent of Singapore's total foreign reserves last year, and seven times the 20-year transport infrastructure spending envisioned by a White Paper released in 1996. By any measure, it is a highly ambitious programme. The question is, will it be economically sustainable to go on ramping up capacity this way? This is especially when capacity is often designed to cater to peak demand, which is usually less than two hours in the morning and two hours in the evening. Hence such a network tends to be "underutilised" for the rest of the day. Average bus occupation, for instance, is only 20 per cent. Transport experts have thus called for other measures such as promoting flexible working hours and telecommuting. Attempts to stagger working hours were made back in the early 1970s to ease traffic congestion. But the campaign never did gain much traction. According to a study published by the Manpower Ministry in 2001, flexi-time was practised by only 0.3 per cent of all private-sector employees. Telecommuting was even more uncommon, with a participation rate of merely 0.1 per cent. And those who work entirely from home accounted for just 0.01 per cent of employees. While more current figures are not readily available, there are signs that flexi-time is still not widely accepted. Last June, the Transport Ministry launched a year-long free-tra-vel initiative to encourage commuters to travel just before the morning peak, following a Travel Smart initiative rolled out in October 2012 to persuade people to shift their peak-hour travel time by 15 minutes. Response was encouraging initially, with around 9 per cent of peak-hour commuters travelling earlier. But this has since fallen to 6 to 7 per cent. Certainly, the scheme has potential for improvement - perhaps even without additional tax spending (the year-long free tra-vel initiative costs $10 million). In 2004, a study by the UK Strategic Rail Authority found that train overcrowding can be eased substantially by widening the differential between peak and off-peak fares. This means giving off-peak fare discounts or wai-vers, as well as raising peak-pe-riod fares. Not only does this help the operator maintain financial viability, but the shift of peak demand also reduces the financial burden of having to run additional trains during peak hour. Analysts suggest the savings here would more than cover the cost of providing free fares. However, adjunct Professor Paul Barter, who teaches transport policy at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, says there are limits to what flexi-time arrangements can do to flatten peak travel volumes. This is because there is "dynamic tension" between two things that people want: a regular schedule that gives them fixed times at home or with friends, and more comfortable travel. Because of this tension, people will modify travel patterns "even without the Government doing anything". And if there is less overcrowding during the peak period because some commuters have altered their travelling time, others will move in to fill the space freed up. Prof Barter, however, notes that flexi-time can contribute to shorter peaks, which range from "five to 10 minutes in Canberra to three to four hours in Jakarta". Also, if people were free to adjust their travelling time, "they would complain less", he said. He feels that many employers in Singapore "are more rigid than they need to be" in this respect. Indeed, a survey by the Land Transport Authority in 2012 found that the top reason for workers not telecommuting was that employers rarely allow it. And about 80 per cent of 1,500 people polled said they would take up flexi-work arrangements if these were made available. Finally, experts say a decentralised city is key to improving accessibility without increasing mobility. Even though Singapore had a decentralisation strategy since the 1980s, it has not gained much traction - until now. "There was a time when it was felt that having a big CBD (Central Business District) was good for the economy," recalls Prof Barter. "But I think it is better to have many sub-centres across the island." Now, several sub-centres are in the works, including Jurong Lake District, Woodlands and the Kallang Riverside. All these will allow more people to live near where they work, and work near where they play. Meanwhile, cities the world over are increasingly looking to "soft" demand management measures to spread out peak loads on transport systems. In 2008, Melbourne started offering free travel to commuters who arrive at the CBD before 7am. It led 23 per cent of commuters to travel out of peak hours. Monetary measures are not the only way to temper peak demand. In the run-up to the 2012 Olympics, London embarked on a public education and awareness campaign to prepare for the foreseeable surge in travel demand. The programme included reducing the need to travel, spacing out journeys, shifting to walking or cycling, as well as re-routing to less busy routes. The result was encouraging. Despite record ridership - London Underground, for instance, carried 4.52 million passengers on Aug 9, the highest in its history - the transport network coped well. Elsewhere, Abu Dhabi has spelt out a transport mobility management strategy as it prepares for a possible trebling of its population by 2030. It includes park-and-ride, car-sharing, flexible working hours, and telecommuting plans. All these are in place in Singapore, even if they lack scale. But things may be changing. Last year, the Urban Redevelopment Authority unveiled plans for a 700km cycling path network by 2030 - thrice the length of the current network. And URA chief planner Lim Eng Hwee leads by example: He cycles to work.

BIG Idea No. 2 is a no-brainer: Make Singapore’s public transportation No. 1 in the world. Why is it a no-brainer? Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur as well as Bangkok and Manila face the danger of more or less permanent gridlock with massive traffic jams. I pray and hope it will not happen, but I am also prepared to take bets it will. But even if our neighbours strangle their cities in this way, their countries will continue. Singapore does not have this option. If our city strangles itself to death with massive traffic jams, both the city and country will collapse. Good public transportation is therefore not an option. In Singapore it is a critical necessity. Unrealised potential FORTUNATELY, we have all the ingredients in place to create the world’s best public transportation system: money, meritocracy and motivation (the three Ms). We are one of the richest countries in the world in terms of financial reserves. We can pay for the best system. We also have one of the best civil services, if not the best, in the world. I know this well as several leading global scholars have asked me why Singapore does so well in public administration. Few other governments in the world can match the quality of minds we have in our Administrative Service. And we also have the motivation. For us, good public transportation is a matter of life and death. With all these assets in place, it was truly shocking to read in The Straits Times on Feb 13 that Singapore’s MRT system is average in the world in terms of system breakdowns. According to Christopher Tan, senior transport correspondent for The Straits Times, “breakdowns on the 125-year-old, 340km, 24-hour New York City subway average one every 260,000km operated. Singapore’s 25-year-old, 180km network breaks down once every 120,000km”. When I told a Harvard professor this fact, he was astounded. He asked me: “Should I be proud of New York or worried for Singapore?” What happened? How did we go from being almost No. 1 in the world in MRT systems to falling behind ancient systems like that of New York? What mistakes did we make? How did it go so badly wrong? And what can we do now to reverse this negative slide and move towards making Singapore truly No. 1 in the world in public transportation? A 2012 PricewaterhouseCoopers survey found that Singapore’s public transport systems ranked behind those of Toronto, London, Stockholm, Paris, Berlin, Tokyo and Hong Kong. Please let me stress one point here. I am not an expert on public transportation. I do not have enough data or information to explain what went wrong. All this requires a massive study. However as an amateur analyst of Singapore’s public policies, I believe that I can point out three challenges Singapore will have to overcome to succeed in its goal of becoming No. 1. All three challenges begin with the letter C. Critical mistakes THE first challenge is conceptual. Public transportation is a public good, not a private good. However, when Singapore was at the height of its infatuation with the Reagan-Thatcher intellectual revolution, we believed that the private sector was better at delivering some public goods than the public sector. This may explain several critical mistakes. My friends in the civil service have told me one of the biggest mistakes we made was to privatise the Public Works Department (PWD) and sell it off. In so doing, we lost both the engineering expertise and a storehouse of wisdom about the maintenance of public works. I hope that some day somebody will try to recreate the old PWD we used to have. We may have also made a mistake in privatising the MRT system, handing over the operation to private companies rather than government departments. In theory, private companies are more efficient than government departments in delivering services. Since they are concerned about the bottom line, they cut costs well. However, private companies do not factor in “externalities”. Hence when the private companies cut down on the maintenance of our MRT tracks to cut costs, they did not factor in the “cost” to the Government’s credibility when the system began to break down frequently. It will literally, not metaphorically, cost the Government billions of dollars to recover this lost credibility. This explains why the Government has provided SMRT with $500 million to improve the maintenance of the MRT tracks. This, in turn, creates public confusion as taxpayers ask why their money should help the bottom line of private companies. There is a simple solution. We should consider making the Ministry of Finance the sole shareholder of all our public transport companies, just as it is the sole shareholder of many government-linked companies. Fresh approach needed THE second challenge is the culture of conservatism. Having invested billions of dollars in an extensive train and bus system, we have worked under the assumption that we can only “tinker” with an established system and not start from scratch. This is a very dangerous and conservative assumption. If we work under this assumption, we will be reluctant to look for structural defects in our current system and be equally reluctant to explore bold and radical moves. If we are going to succeed in our goal of becoming No. 1 in the world in public transportation, we have to consider radical as well as conservative approaches. Here is one radical suggestion: Organise a global competition to encourage universities, think- tanks and global companies all over the world to put forward a new blueprint for Singapore’s public transportation system. There is a lot of expertise out there. A $10 million prize would be sufficient to attract a whole slew of new blueprints. And $10 million would be a small sum to spend considering the billions we have to put in to deal with systemic flaws. The winners of this global competition could be announced when we celebrate our 50th anniversary next year. Social experiments THE third C challenge we face is “comprehensiveness”. Public transportation can work well only if its planning is well integrated into existing urban planning policies. Each limb of our national planning must support other limbs. Let me cite a few examples. First, we have to deal with the “car” problem. As I explained in my previous column, despite the many disincentives put in place to discourage car ownership and use, we have actually created an ecosystem which makes it more rational to drive a car than to take public transport. We now have to create a new ecosystem that discourages car ownership and use. For a start, we should encourage new road experiments to change behaviour. In the year 2015, as part of our 50th anniversary celebration, we should exempt all taxis from paying Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) charges for one year. The goal of this social experiment is to see whether Singaporeans will make the rational decision to leave their cars at home and take taxis into the Central Business District to save on ERP charges. At the same time, we will also discover whether this leads to a surge in the supply of taxis in the CBD. This increase in supply of taxis in the CBD could, over time, increase demand and use of taxis in the CBD. I don’t know whether this will happen. Nobody knows whether it will happen. This is why we have to try out bold experiments. The financial cost of giving taxis exemption from ERP charges will be peanuts compared to the benefits we will get if people leave their cars at home. A downtown HDB estate? SECONDLY, we should consider the merits of building a massive HDB estate downtown. A lot of land will be freed up when the Marina Bay Golf Course lease ends. Why not build a big HDB estate there? The obvious response will be that the land is too expensive. But the land will not be as expensive as the land in Manhattan. In October 2011, I visited Manhattan in my capacity as chairman of the nominating committee of the Lee Kuan Yew World City Prize (New York subsequently won the prize in 2012). On this visit, the surprising thing I learnt was that Manhattan had a policy to ensure that it did not create an environment where only millionaires and billionaires could afford to live. Hence, even though the mayor of New York City then was a billionaire, Mr Michael Bloomberg, his administration worked hard to set aside land in this expensive midtown and downtown area for workers to live. Mayor Bloomberg’s New Housing Market Place Plan was designed to build and preserve 165,000 income-restricted units by June this year for 500,000 New Yorkers. It was the largest municipal affordable housing plan in American history. To some extent, this is what we did when we built the Pinnacle in Tanjong Pagar. We should now replicate the Pinnacle experiment in our new CBD. It is true that Singapore citizens who live in this CBD public housing will get a subsidy. However, if they use less public transportation to commute into the CBD, they will not be using the subsidies that are being given to every user of public transport. We will also enhance the social harmony of Singapore by giving less well-off Singaporeans a stake in the CBD. The third social experiment we can try is to build shoe-box garages next to every MRT station. The idea would be to allow us to walk out of an MRT station and rent a two-seater air-conditioned electric vehicle to take us across the last mile of our journey (and back). Clearly, our hot and humid weather makes it difficult to walk the last mile to our destination. Hence we have to create ingenious solutions to encourage people to avoid driving and take public transport. And soon we may have driver-less vehicles which will be able to do this job too. There are many ways we can make Singapore’s public transportation No. 1 in the world. If there is one country in the world that has the means and motivation to achieve this goal, it is Singapore. So why don’t we just get started?

At a recent Chinese New Year lunch, a senior civil servant suggested that I write an article on why Singaporeans should give up their aspiration to own a car. Half-jokingly, I said I would - provided there was no major MRT incident for six months in a row. By "major", I meant incidents that disrupt service for more than 30 minutes each. The condition is fair and, in fact, is one I think train operators SMRT and SBS Transit should aim for. While it is unreasonable to expect machines to operate without a single glitch, it is reasonable to expect major incidents to be kept to a minimum. After all, rail systems are inherently robust and durable. And a system that is as new, short and costly as ours should have fewer breakdowns. For instance, breakdowns on the 125-year-old, 340km, 24-hour New York City subway average one every 260,000km operated. Singapore's 25-year-old, 180km network breaks down once every 120,000km. What is essential is a proper maintenance regimen, which train operators and regulators must nail down if the country is to promote public transport - which is intrinsically slower and less comfortable than the car - as a choice transport mode. And if a mode of transport cannot be as comfortable or speedy as the private car, it should at least be reliable. A major train breakdown impacts passengers travelling on the affected line as well as those in other parts of the rail network. Even minor incidents can trigger this ripple effect, but to a lesser extent. Not only that, a major incident calls for bus bridging, which can impact bus commuters and road users at large, when bus services are diverted to cater to stranded train passengers. That is why major incidents have to be minimised. And on this front, Singapore has some way to go. The total number of disruptions lasting more than five minutes in 2011, 2012 and 2013 were 393, 396 and 309 respectively. Disruptions lasting more than 30 minutes each fell from 11 in 2011 to eight in 2012. It remained at eight last year. For incidents lasting more than an hour, the figure went from six in 2011 to four in 2012, but rose to five last year. This year has not begun well for train operators. In January alone, there were three incidents lasting more than 30 minutes each. Of these, two stretched beyond an hour. These are not comforting numbers. Last year, more than 130,000 commuters were affected by disruptions lasting more than an hour, or about the same number in 2012. While the figures are far smaller than the 250,000 inconvenienced by major breakdowns in 2011, they are still significant - representing more than 10 per cent of train commuters. You could calculate the economic impact of such delays, but that would be irrelevant in today's argument. The crux of the issue is: How do you convince people they should not aspire to own a car, when the probability of them being caught in a major rail disruption is so significant? It is hard to quantify the cost of a delay, even if you can quantify the value of time. The confusion, the discomfort, the anxiety of not knowing when one can complete one's journey - these make up the anatomy of a delay. And being caught in one on a day when there is an all-important test or interview you cannot be late for can be devastating. Especially so for folks who cannot afford the luxury of a cab, and have to rely 100 per cent on public transport. The unhappiness over an MRT delay is arguably deeper than say, a bus delay, because of the high expectations commuters attach to rail travel. The frequency and punctuality of trains now far exceed standards attained by buses. Also, in some cases, a rail breakdown entails passengers walking on tracks or in tunnels - which can potentially be hazardous. Or to put it another way: How can drivers be persuaded to give up their cars when the rail network - the backbone of the public transport system - is in a state where there is one major incident every six to seven weeks? Consider, too, that even without major incidents, the system is straining at the seams. Packed carriages, crowded station platforms, lower operating speeds and patchy air-conditioning are recurring complaints. Frayed nerves and short fuses have become par for the course. Professor Kishore Mahbubani, dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, went as far as hypothesising that another major MRT breakdown, "combined with declining trust in public institutions", could result in "the perfect combination for a riot or two". He said that in an Opinion piece for this paper last April. Last week, he followed up with an article on how car ownership and usage rates seem to be dipping in the West - and why Singaporeans should take a leaf from that trend. I concur with his observations. But the reasons for the disenchantment with the car in the West are worsening congestion, parking woes and a growing environmental consciousness (especially among the young). These are not strong motivations here. In fact, they often do not apply. Compared to most major cities, the roads here are relatively free-flowing and parking is aplenty. And environmental concerns do not yet seem to rank high among people here - young or old. But the car's biggest attraction must be its speed and efficiency. Door-to-door journeys by car in Singapore is often less than half the average time taken by public transport. As long as this huge gap remains, the aspiration to own a car will remain. The balance, however, tilts substantially in favour of public transport if your points of origin and destination are both on the doorstep of an MRT station. Not only that, people living near stations are more likely to use public transport. According to the Land Transport Authority's latest Household Interview Travel Survey, among people who live within 400m of an MRT station, 71 per cent take public transport. The percentage drops to 67 per cent if the distance is 800m. And for those living beyond 2km of a station, only 55 per cent take public transport. As the rail network expands, more and more of us will live and work within walking distance of a station. By 2030, the network is expected to almost double to 360km, and 80 per cent of households should be within 10 minutes' walk to a station (up from around 60 per cent today). But the increased coverage will be quite meaningless if it is not paired with better reliability. On that score, it is good to know the Government and the transport operators are pulling out all the stops to fix things. It may take a while, but there is optimism that standards Singaporeans have come to expect can be re-established. And just for the record: The senior civil servant accepted my "challenge". Six months, no more than one breakdown over 30 minutes. The clock begins ticking in the Year of the Horse. -- ST ILLUSTRATION: MIEL by Christopher Tan

In my January 2014 column, I said that Singaporeans should use 2014 to think of new Big Ideas to guide us for the next 50 years. Here is Big Idea No.1 for debate and discussion. Singapore will never be car-less, but it can and should have fewer cars. On reading this, the reader could be forgiven for thinking: ''Here goes Kishore again on his campaign to improve public transport in Singapore.'' However, this big idea is not about improving transportation. It is about improving the happiness of the Singapore population. Unhappy Singaporeans IT IS a well-known fact that the Singaporean population is not the happiest in the world. Singaporeans gripe, naturally and effortlessly. One good example of this was provided by a Straits Times article written after the Prime Minister had spoken to a group of students at the Nanyang Technological University on Jan 30. The article began with the following line: ''Nine out of 15 interviewed were concerned they won't be able to buy a flat and a car.'' The aspiration of the young for a flat is perfectly reasonable. But the aspiration of nine out of 15 for a car is not reasonable. Why not? The simple, direct and blunt answer is that if Singapore tries to squeeze the American dream - designed for a huge, almost boundless continent - into one of the tiniest countries in the world, it will effectively condemn its population to perpetual unhappiness. High car ownership ONE little known fact about Singapore is that it has one of the highest car ownership populations in the world for a city. (Repeat: For a city, and not for a country.) Mr Charles Chow, who blogs on transportation issues, says the following: ''There are roughly 550,000 to 600,000 private vehicles in Singapore. Forty-five per cent of households in Singapore own at least one car. This implies that out of the approximate 1.25 million households in Singapore, about 560,000 households have at least one car. There are 200,000 private dwellings in Singapore and slightly more than one million Housing and Development Board (HDB) flats. My simple back-of-the-envelope calculation therefore shows that more than 300,000 HDB or public housing dwellings own at least one car. Since HDB dwellings are heavily subsidised, the fact that they are also given abundant and cheap residential HDB carparks represent a further subsidy.'' Mr Chow also notes the contrast between Singapore and other cities: ''From London to Hong Kong, only the top 10 to 20 per cent of household dwellings come with carparks. Without a carpark, residents just simply cannot buy a car. In Singapore, the Government has so generously provided abundant and cheap residential carparking in the HDB estates over the years. From New York to Tokyo, office buildings are deliberately built with few or no carparks. ''In Singapore, that is not the case. Even middle managers can drive their cars to work and park their cars in office building carparks for the whole day.'' Having lived in New York for 10 years, I can only agree with Mr Chow when he says: ''Anyone who has lived in New York or Tokyo would know that even managing directors of companies, senior bankers and lawyers take public transportation to work. In Singapore, even middle-level executives working in Raffles Place drive to work. Is the Singaporean middle-level executive better paid than a senior banker in New York?'' Car ownership encouraged IN SHORT, in a country that has designed public policies to restrict car ownership (from the compulsory certificate of entitlement to high import taxes), Singapore has paradoxically ended up creating an environment that actually encourages rather than discourages car ownership. There are three ways in which Singapore encourages car ownership. Firstly, as the world's only city state, the Singapore Government wisely decided in its early years that the country would strangle itself to death as an economy if it allowed Bangkok-style traffic jams to clog our streets. But while Singapore has succeeded in creating free-flowing traffic, this has paradoxically made it rational to own a car. This is also why I own a car. I can get from my home in Siglap to my school in Bukit Timah in less than 20 minutes by driving. Any combination of public transport would take at least an hour each way. I save 80 minutes a day by driving. This provides a huge incentive to own a car. (My ultimate dream, however, is to forego owning a car. Instead, I would like to have a driverless electric vehicle - similar to the one the National University of Singapore is testing - appear at my home within 30 minutes of calling. As I learnt in Davos last month, I will be able to achieve this dream in my lifetime.) Secondly, by ensuring that car prices are among the highest in the world, Singapore has made the car one of the most important status symbols in Singapore. This explains the attraction of European car brands in Singapore. In most cases, a Japanese or Korean car can do the job of transportation equally well. But it will not enhance one's status. A European brand does. This is how we try to keep up with ''the Joneses'' in Singapore. Thirdly, as Mr Chow says, our subsidy of carparks in HDB estates makes it much easier and cheaper to own and park a car than it would be in New York, London, Tokyo or Paris. Since this subsidy has become entrenched in our society, it cannot be taken away. Any government that tries to take back perks that a population has become accustomed to is a government that wants to commit political suicide. It would be unfair to ask any government to do this. Bottom-up approach ALL this brings me to the most important point that I want to make in this article. Singapore has succeeded in its first 50 years because it had a government that thought carefully over the long term and crafted policies that would enhance the long-term interests of Singapore. This is why Singapore has free-flowing traffic. However, over the next 50 years, a new paradigm will be needed: What is needed now is a society where the people think carefully and advocate policies that are good for Singapore's long-term interests. In short, a bottom-up instead of a top-down approach is needed to solve the car problem of Singapore. In the first 50 years, Singapore had a government designing various policies to temper the desire for Singaporeans to own cars. Now, society needs to decide that since Singapore is one of the tiniest countries in the world, people should gradually give up the desire to own cars. Most Singaporeans reading this article would scoff at this notion. Let me share some good news here. In most developed countries, people are already using cars less, not more. Trend towards fewer cars AN ARTICLE from The Economist on Sept 22, 2012, provides some encouraging statistics. In the leading economies in the world (Japan, France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States) ''total vehicle kilometres travelled began to plateau in 2004 and fall from 2007; measured per person, growth flatlined sooner, after 2000, and dropped after 2004 before recovering somewhat''. According to World Bank data, passenger cars per 1,000 people in the US have been gradually declining since at least 2003, a trend which accelerated somewhat after the onset of the recession in 2008. Equally encouragingly, young people in the developed world are getting driver's licences later in life (or not at all). This is good news for congestion because, according to a study conducted in the UK, people who learn to drive in their late 20s drive less than if they had learnt in their late teens. Singaporeans are proud of the fact that the country has gone from ''Third World to First World'' faster than any other nation in human history. Now, for the next 50 years, Singapore has to catch up with the First World in terms of moving away from car ownership as a dream. In my next article - Big Idea No.2 - I hope to demonstrate it is possible to make Singapore No.1 in the world when it comes to public transportation. -- ST ILLUSTRATION : Manny Francisco by Kishore Mahbubani The writer is dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore. He is the author of The Great Convergence: Asia, The West, And The Logic Of One World, which has been long-listed for the 2014 Lionel Gelber Prize, described by The Economist as ''the world's most important award for non-fiction''.

ECONOMISTS generally prefer to meet society's desire for equity through targeted, lump-sum transfers to the poor rather than across-the-board subsidies that depress prices. This is because broad-based subsidies not only distort prices, but their main beneficiaries are also usually the rich. Where targeted transfers are provided, the dominant view in economics is that the state should finance these subsidies. This is because equity is a social concern; it is only fair that society - rather than profit-maximising firms - pays. Seen from this perspective, the Public Transport Council's (PTC) announcement of fare increases, combined with targeted help financed by the Government for lower-income individuals and other segments of the commuting public, are both efficient and equitable. Yet, announcements of fare increases in Singapore are usually met with acrimony by a sceptical public. Why is this? One reason could be that commuters are unimpressed by the quality of our public transport system. Trains and buses are crowded during peak hours, and delays are common. When confronted by these inconveniences, it is tempting for commuters to ask why there should be any fare increases at all, and to point to the healthy profits that Singapore's two public transport operators (PTOs) enjoy as evidence that the fare increases are unjustified. Another reason is scepticism over the fare adjustment formula the PTC uses. This formula, which was revised late last year, is (rightly) responsive to the cost structure of the PTOs. But given the duopolistic structure of the public transport industry here, it is fair to ask how regulators could possibly know if our PTOs' cost structure is efficient. This asymmetry of information between regulators and operators bedevils all markets with regulated monopolies. In a market where there is genuine competition between many producers, consumers are far more likely to accept price hikes caused by across-the-board cost increases. But in a duopolistic market such as Singapore's public transport industry, even justified price increases might seem like price-gouging to consumers. In short, the question of whether a fare increase is perceived as fair and justified is often linked to how the public transport industry structure is organised. But the reality is that organisational form - whether it is government organisation or a commercial one - is a poor predictor of how efficient or productive an organisation will be. The experience of public transport privatisations elsewhere has been mixed at best. In some cases, such as the privatisation of the British Rail and the London Underground public-private partnership, privatisation has failed and required large capital injections by governments to bail out failing private operators. This does not suggest that publicly run transport systems have been resounding successes. A government-run public transport system may remove the problem of information asymmetry between regulator and operators, but there is no guarantee it would result in higher efficiency and lower fares. If a government-managed public transport system achieves lower fares via operating subsidies by the state, commuters would be paying for those subsidies indirectly through their taxes. Perhaps, the missing variable in the PTC's fare revision exercise is that it is not seen as being fair enough. First, insights from behavioural economics suggest that in most people's minds, losses loom larger than gains. Various experiments suggest that we value losses twice as much as gains of the same size. This suggests that our adverse reaction to a fare increase is much stronger than our positive reaction to the offsetting subsidies. Second, there is no penalty built into the fare review mechanism to penalise the PTOs for poor quality. The Fare Review Committee preferred to address quality lapses outside of the fare review mechanism. The committee's decision is not without merits. Fares should be set based on the cost of doing business on the assumption that the PTOs are performing at the standards set by the regulator. If the PTOs are constantly penalised for poor quality through lower fares, they may end up in a financial position that makes it difficult for them to meet the prescribed quality standards in the first instance. Nevertheless, this well-intentioned approach of decoupling penalties for poor quality from the computation of fares is insensitive to people's equity bias. It severs the link people want to see between price and quality. Commuters may thus interpret higher fares without a commensurate improvement in quality as simply a reward for mediocrity. To satisfy the public's demands for fairness, policymakers can consider harmonising their fare review cycles with their reviews of the PTOs' performance.That way, the public will have less reason to believe that the PTOs are taking them for a ride - in more ways than one. -- ST FILE PHOTO by Donald Low and Alisha Gill for The Straits Times

The newly opened $4.3 billion Marina Coastal Expressway (MCE) is a breathtaking engineering feat by any measure. Part of the mega tunnel (five lanes in each direction) under the seabed had to be built in soft marine clay, while rechannelling 2,000 cubic metres of water a second flowing from the Marina Bay. After four years of complex work costing a prodigious $860 million a kilometre, the sleek expressway deserved a triumphal opening rather than two-hour delays for users resulting from snarls at a few points en route. First-day teething problems are to be expected, of course, but to what extent can glitches be anticipated when dealing with high volumes and multiple connections? This is a challenge which calls for an interdisciplinary approach that is not always second nature to mega project supervisors. When VivoCity was opened to much fanfare in 2006, as Singapore's largest mall offering over a million sq ft of retail space, the crowds encountered bottlenecks and navigation problems in the labyrinthine complex. Despite tapping acclaimed Japanese architect Toyo Ito and the latest building technology then, VivoCity's experience showed plans can go awry when attention is not paid to usability details - like signage and human factors that influence traffic flows. Usability is a concept that is more associated with the information superhighway than in other areas where layouts, movements and interactions warrant a closer study of users. In the digital sphere, designers might leverage design engineering, philosophy, cognitive psychology and ergonomics to improve user experience. The management of transport and public facilities also calls for a look at social behaviour and real- world patterns of usage, among others. Indeed, usability stress tests ought to be the norm before rolling out facilities to the public. In the case of the MCE, planners had to also consider the needs of fringe commuters. For example, those from Fort Road going to the city via the East Coast Parkway (ECP) need to thread through an East Coast Park service road. Rather than using makeshift directional signs, a broader effort to build public awareness of the changes is needed well before an opening. Maps and videos created for this purpose should also be tested for clarity and effectiveness. When usability is adequately addressed, users are more likely to rise above inconveniences and appreciate the logic of removing part of the old ECP in the Marina area. The new Central Business District needs room to grow, with new sections blending smoothly with the old. Planning such linkages is as much an art as a science. What will make a difference is always bearing in mind the needs of users.