Despite the numerous accolades and praise heaped on our public transport system, it remains the truth that a significant majority of Singaporeans still find that nothing beats the convenience of owning your own set of wheels. And I suspect that no matter how much more our public transport system improves, there will still be a large number of car owning and driving Singaporeans.

I have been endeavouring to utilize a mix of public transport along with driving. And from experience, public transport is fine only where the distance is short and the travelling time is less than 30 minutes. As you move beyond that level, driving becomes a far more attractive proposition. Despite the jams and despite the fact that you are paying through the nose for pretty much every thing related to your car.

It all boils down to the fact that driving is so much more convenient.

There are always one or two places ill served by public transport. Where taking the MRT or the bus would take a disproportionately long amount of time and you would have to leave way in advance. In such a case, even a tiny delay could snowball into a huge timing difference. You can choose to either run the risk of being massively late or arrive way too early. For such long routes, the stars have to be really aligned in your favour for you to get there on the dot. It has happened to me only once or twice in past few years.

Proponents of public transport always have a ready retort when I raise the point of convenience. "Take taxi lah!"

Unfortunately, trying to catch a cab can be a real pain sometimes. Have you ever seen the long taxi queues at some places? Or the difficulty in securing a taxi (even by telephone booking) when the place you are at or the place you are heading to is considered "ulu"? Throw some bad weather into the mix and getting a cab is pretty much like smashing one's head against the wall.

Really, I suspect that many of those public transport proponents have seldom had ready access to a car or only move around in places extremely well connected by public transport. For me, staying in an ulu part of Singapore, I will stick to driving as much as possible. And I am eagerly awaiting the day, where I can opt to leave the car at home without almost certainly regretting it.

So has anyone successfully made the conversion from driving to fully taking public transport? Care to share how you did it?

motoring, singapore and 1 more...

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