Public Bus Transport.

Public transport is a necessity for many people. Not everyone can afford a car. Taxis are costly lot to hire. Hire services like Grab and its equivalents are still costly. Light rail transit or mass rail transit need shuttle bus services to get people to a station, except for those who can travel by car and can pay a lot to park their cars at the station while they use the LRT or MRT trains. Using a car comes with tax an, insurance and fuel costs which makes ownership of a car best suited to those who can afford to own and maintain them, As such, public bus services must be provided and subsidised if need be. 

If we examine who are the people who use public bus services, we will see an interesting cross section of society. Most of the users are students, the elderly, housewives, and low wage workers. These are often folk who cannot afford a car. Even affluent people or ordinary clerical workers who can afford a car, too use the public bus service as a way to reduce the costs inherent in using a car. 

However, the public bus service is cut to some areas such as travelling to the capital city because of a fall in passengers. The fall in passengers is attributable to affluent people moving into a residential area and who happen to own cars. As poorer people sell their houses to the rich and move out of a residential area, there is a fall in he users of the public bus system. 

Bus companies who provide services based on economic considerations and are not subsidised cut their services and as result force people who cannot afford cars hve to use the LRT and MRT systems with the attendant delays in getting to a LRT or MRT station. Is this fair? Is this the right thing to do?

My area has not been serviced to KL for the past few years. The section of society I mentioned who use the public bus service now suffer. The LRT and MRT services do not always cover all the areas in KL. When one reaches a LRT or MRT station and the destination is far away, then another bus or a taxi must be used. This is causing great inconvenience.

 Therefore, what is needed now is for the authorities to review the routes the public bus service takes and if need be subsidise uneconomic routes.