JULY 12 ― I was not amused reading the news while outside the Connaught MRT station, two nights ago.
Well mixed feelings, in a sordid way.
Prasarana, which runs the city buses and the MRT feeder buses — one of which I was waiting for right then — had managed to increase the cost of the LRT3 project by three times.
Mixed because, while depressed to note the bus stop’s stretch of lights have been out of order for two nights straight leaving us literally in darkness, Prasarana is bungling far bigger issues worth far more than the fuse to light up 12 inoperable fluorescent tubes.
Maybe it is an allegory of the company in charge of keeping a nation mobile, they rather leave us clambering blind than moving forward.
Public transportation is personal to me.
With decades of envy when visiting “example” cities around the world like Melbourne, Tokyo, London and yes, cringe, Singapore, I waited with bated breath for Kuala Lumpur to catch up. Even with horror stories of no reliable public transport in rural areas, proponents hoped once it arrives in Kuala Lumpur, it’ll spread to the rest of the country.
But this news about the LRT3... with a new government, something must be done. I realise the finance minister has given an ultimatum to Prasarana, but will heads roll? Malaysians are used to promises of action against mismanagement of government assets, but can you blame us to be highly sceptical of actual action?
#MalaysiaBaru can yet surprise us perhaps.
I decided to visit the Prasarana website, in lieu of the development, and I was gobsmacked.
It reads:
“Prasarana Malaysia Berhad or Prasarana in short has become Malaysia’s largest and leading public transportation provider. Actively becoming an international player, we extend our expertise abroad to nations in seek of public transportation consultancy or operators.”
None of Prasarana’s operations are profitable, not even close to it; Rapid KL, MRT feeder buses, Monorail, LRT1, LRT2, MRT and Sunway BRT; and instead of knuckling down to fix it they actively seek to be an international player? Apparently, they operate a loss-making train service in Saudi Arabia.
Why not deliver at home especially since you are a wholly government owned company?
The finance minister and other ministers seek votes in Shah Alam and Kepong — incidentally RapidKL has no ride plan from my locality to the former (AEON Big Kepong).
If they can’t help Klang Valley residents in densely populated Cheras to get to equally dense Kepong within the same metropolitan, should they offer to help the rest of the world?
If the world was knocking on our doors because umpteen overjoyed travellers on our public transportation are spared of unscrupulous taxi drivers or exorbitant hotel transport services, then Prasarana is selfish not to assist.
What cruelty to have a world class system and not share the knowledge with the world, right?
But the irony is, we have a system that sucks and while Prasarana claims to be the largest and leading public transportation provider in the country, it’s only a placebo.
It’s the largest because the old Mahathir government forced the city’s buses to merge and passed the new trains to them. They lead because they are a monopoly.
Prasarana can be proud if Malaysians are delighted with their work. We aren’t. Most young people hope their first job pays quickly for a car to avert the pain of commute.
The job
I’ve had a go at the company, but what should be the focus of Prasarana?
Operations, not overextend by manipulating the construction of LRT3 by reworking stations, track and engineering planning.
To this end, it’s about capacity, ridership and public relations. And a crucial third, campaign.
Operate the buses and trains already under them with excellence.
Capacity to meet the number of people in absolute terms, not sardine can people during peak hours. Not about population divided to train carriages, but population per peak period to their localities matched to available rides.
Ridership; encourage residents to choose the commute over private vehicles. Maximise benefits at off peak, so even non-office users — college students, pensioners, tourists and shift workers — commute.
Public relations; communicate clearly and constantly to improve user experience — adopt global best practices. Information repositories, interactive features and engaging staff members are imperative.
Campaign because a monopoly has a bird’s eye-view. It is cognisant of volume, property development, economic paradigms and cultural shifts, so it picks the right campaign to sustain its relevance and load.
For example, the MRT is underutilised because Prasarana and its various subsidiaries have not “asked” people enough to ride, or “guided” them through the experience, and “thanked them” for saving the planet, and their travel time.
For the riders, the system works or appears attractive if every space in the locality is covered by the network, door to door. It must be complementary, complete and communicated.
Any city with a public transport system which works well ends up on the envy list, as suggested at the top.
It guarantees arrivals, tourist arrivals. And the liveability draws expats and industries to locate there.
For Kuala Lumpur and other cities, it is a centrepiece to their attractiveness.
For both the ministers, Lim Guan Eng at Finance and Anthony Loke at Transport, there is an amazing opportunity to leave a true legacy which will be appreciated by millions of Malaysians.
The light that never shines
My aunt used to say, “if you can’t care for your school clothes (I was filthy kicking about on the field), how are you going to save the country?”
I suppose the long and short is, if after decades Prasarana can’t get a grip on operations of the largest and leading network in the country, then maybe they should work much, much harder on it, like not wait two days to fix the lights at a station which just turned one year old.
Their neglect of the basic but highly important tasks while focusing on expansion of roles and power worries me, and it should worry especially those in power.
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
