Thoughts on a car-lite Singapore as a car owner?

[Throttle2]

42 minutes ago, happy_man said:

 

 

Ah...this is what I am talking about - the social repercussion, not counting the stakeholders in SG's lucrative private car market.

Imagine when the Gov really wanna push for "car lite" country. Who will be the 1st to kanna negatively?

The auto loan coy, oil businesses, aftermarket automobile sectors and even shops and outlets that provide free parking like Ikea and Giants etc.

Basically private car ownership and usage has become one of the very important aspect of social interactions.

We can see that during festive seasons from Hari Raya to CNY or holiday seasons - pple wanna drive and use it as part of their lives.

Now, imagine we have to foot a bomb just to drive and park to eat at your favorite Bakut Teh stall in an HDB wetmarket...

 

social repercussions?

they dont really care about social ills and repercussions.

they already f**ked things up with ABSD 😂😁  which forces married couples to own houses seperately.

and also the many rules which forces people to buy private housing or divorce or get married etc etc etc…..

 

muayhahahaha.   If you hv to foot a bomb to drive park and eat BKT , then you may decide not to…..thats the whole idea isnt it?🤣

 

[Throttle2]

23 minutes ago, mikk123 said:

summary in short. they also don't know how.... Harvard/oxford also never teach how. 

already say liao

Up the Road tax by 3 times

no loans allowed for car purchases.

Who dares, wins

[CarGuy88]

I am totally for controlling the overall car population, and to some extent ERP to control congestion. From living overseas for 5 years and from my travels to other cities, I think there is value to capping the overall vehicle population and ERP (even though they are really painful).

That said, I am 100% anti-car lite. It's a stupid confused idea rooted in a mix of hippie save-the-earth thinking and politics (a way to kill off people's car-owning aspirations so they won't be unhappy when they can't own a car).

The way it's been implemented has been utterly stupid too. E.g. drawing bus lanes in neighbourhood roads with normal traffic - which then results in congestion. No congestion before bus lane, buses not delayed to begin with. Buses still not delayed with bus lanes, but congestion for cars now. When you go from 3 lanes to 2, isn't that an obvious outcome?

This gives a suspicion (of course we will never know) that someone with a bus lane KPI was made to draw x KM of bus lanes in order to meet it.

Don't even get me started on the utter folly of distance based ERP. All it does is penalise people who live in the far flung areas, who may not have the means to buy a more central property, and who heeded the government's encouragement to stay in far flung areas. And there's that stupid screen they will mount on your windshield and the cash card module which they will mount on the passenger footwell. 

And then there's that recent petrol tax increase...car lite can be abused to justify anything.

In short, car lite should make public transport better. It doesn't have to entail making driving worse. The aim should be for both to improve at the same time. After all, no citizen wants to see any aspect of their life get tangibly worse over the years!

Edited August 26, 2021 by CarGuy88

[Phluvcat]

2 hours ago, Ct3833 said:

car lite is not car zero, improving transport infra  and better town planning would help reduce usage of cars.  Whereas reducing COE would reduce car ownership which is already in place and proven absolutely effective. 

 

Yeah thought last time garment want independent satellite towns which are self sufficient, reduce travel distance, inter town travels, etc. 

Encourage people shop online, demolish orchard road make smaller (some things still need to shop but we dun need carbon copy items everywhere) and make recreation area with very little car parking. 

With current climate shopping centres sooner or later turn into gigantic multi floors of eateries, the rest dying a slow death. 

[boonhat_91]

Car lite is all well and good, I fully support less congestion.

Spoiler

 

As long as I'm not the one giving up owning a car.

There, I said it.

 

 

[Rayleigh]

Am fortunate that my home and workplace are within 8 mins walk to train stations. Since COVID and couple with cohorting, have been taking train to work. Enjoying the ample me time on the train, doing reading and beo-ing babes!!!  
 

Use the car only for family related activities such as dinner and groceries and visiting. Light on wallet and more me time 

[Phluvcat]

1 hour ago, Throttle2 said:

social repercussions?

they dont really care about social ills and repercussions.

they already f**ked things up with ABSD 😂😁  which forces married couples to own houses seperately.

and also the many rules which forces people to buy private housing or divorce or get married etc etc etc…..

 

muayhahahaha.   If you hv to foot a bomb to drive park and eat BKT , then you may decide not to…..thats the whole idea isnt it?🤣

 

Funny we grow our economy yet our lives seems to get more constrained, confused, constricted, convoluted, basically more and more cons. 

We basically forgot we have only one Earth and its not going to expand, and that all elements are finite while we are still on this Earth. 

We can only become more efficient but then comes technology, with the irony that now it is fuelling the exploitation of everything just because now it is easy and convenient to do so.  We have become so wasteful individually and collectively.

I just feel so humanity is a joke.  Hmm... 

[Stratovarius]

11 hours ago, welik72 said:

This recent article wrote about Singapore's direction towards a car-lite city. I personally think that the idea of my neighbourhood being car-lite is a good one – if key establishments (grocery stores, eateries, retail, medical and recreational spaces) are integrated well and concentrated in the vicinity, all accessible without the use of a car. It'd encourage less casual use of a car within the neighbourhood as you would only need to use it to get from one neighbourhood to another.

I'm curious about your thoughts on this? What kind of infrastructure/policies do you think is needed to encourage car owners like ya'll to drive cars less and embrace a car-lite society? Is it even possible for Singapore to have a completely car-free district and if yes, where?

If your house downstairs got a very famous kway chup store, you wont find it nice. Need to drive out 45mins to another famous stall then that one nice. So that's not going to work. 

Generally i dont drive if im staying in the same neighbourhood. Unless im going multiple places, rushing for time, bringing a few people or carrying bulky items, else i just BMW. i think SG is quite well equipped with neighbourhood amenities. What we need to tackle is better connectivity infrastructure for longer distances. One good example say jurong to punggol. Driving between these 2 places is already quite tiring. Not to say taking public transport. More direct bus service, like those express buses, connecting different areas directly and not going round & round in a neighbourhood and then moved on to the next. Like bus 969, from woodlands to pasir ris. We should have more buses like that. 

[Jtis]

3 hours ago, Throttle2 said:

Up road tax by 3 times.

Car purchases must be full settled, no loans nor hire purchase allowed

problem solved already. 
 

dare or not? 

 

In my opinion, doesn't work. If you make lump sum costs astronomical, ppl will simply drive more to maximise utility. It's human nature. 

 

I really really hate to admit it, because it is going to hurt all of us drivers' pockets. But making discretionary cost higher, is what will deter usage. 

[Throttle2]

10 minutes ago, Jtis said:

In my opinion, doesn't work. If you make lump sum costs astronomical, ppl will simply drive more to maximise utility. It's human nature. 

 

I really really hate to admit it, because it is going to hurt all of us drivers' pockets. But making discretionary cost higher, is what will deter usage. 

Wanna bet?

hee hee hee

anyway its so stupid. COEs are in their hands just reduce the quota for COEs , instantly less cars on the roads 

muayhahhagag

[Jamesc]

I also don't drive all the time.

In the time before Covid I always take public transport

 

 

when I travel between countries by air.

[Jamesc]

I support car-lite Singapore.

I always like lite-cars.

Why must they be all so heavy?

[Jamesc]

Trick question!

There are no car owners in SG.

We all just rent for 10 years. 

[Didu]

3 hours ago, Throttle2 said:

anyway its so stupid. COEs are in their hands just reduce the quota for COEs , instantly less cars on the roads 

muayhahhagag

They want the funds collected from COE, but don't want these cars to occupy the road. It's a love-hate thing. That's how they come up with ERP 2.0 to limit car usage. This doesn't make sense to consumers, but Govt don't really care does it? 

[Throttle2]

4 hours ago, Phluvcat said:

Funny we grow our economy yet our lives seems to get more constrained, confused, constricted, convoluted, basically more and more cons. 

We basically forgot we have only one Earth and its not going to expand, and that all elements are finite while we are still on this Earth. 

We can only become more efficient but then comes technology, with the irony that now it is fuelling the exploitation of everything just because now it is easy and convenient to do so.  We have become so wasteful individually and collectively.

I just feel so humanity is a joke.  Hmm... 

I may not totally agree with you but your last sentence i agree.

[Datsun366]

4 hours ago, CarGuy88 said:

I am totally for controlling the overall car population, and to some extent ERP to control congestion. From living overseas for 5 years and from my travels to other cities, I think there is value to capping the overall vehicle population and ERP (even though they are really painful).

That said, I am 100% anti-car lite. It's a stupid confused idea rooted in a mix of hippie save-the-earth thinking and politics (a way to kill off people's car-owning aspirations so they won't be unhappy when they can't own a car).

The way it's been implemented has been utterly stupid too. E.g. drawing bus lanes in neighbourhood roads with normal traffic - which then results in congestion. No congestion before bus lane, buses not delayed to begin with. Buses still not delayed with bus lanes, but congestion for cars now. When you go from 3 lanes to 2, isn't that an obvious outcome?

This gives a suspicion (of course we will never know) that someone with a bus lane KPI was made to draw x KM of bus lanes in order to meet it.

Don't even get me started on the utter folly of distance based ERP. All it does is penalise people who live in the far flung areas, who may not have the means to buy a more central property, and who heeded the government's encouragement to stay in far flung areas. And there's that stupid screen they will mount on your windshield and the cash card module which they will mount on the passenger footwell. 

And then there's that recent petrol tax increase...car lite can be abused to justify anything.

In short, car lite should make public transport better. It doesn't have to entail making driving worse. The aim should be for both to improve at the same time. After all, no citizen wants to see any aspect of their life get tangibly worse over the years!

Buses.

Ya can get rid of the specialized lane system by making buses the king of the road, even alphas and engines and polis subservient to them.

Cut in front of bus/tailgate or any minor endangerment severe as in confirmed jail, driving license/ insurance penalty and much fine. Jaywalking or riding bicycles blocking a bus is legally punishable severely as well. Only on proof of emergency can be acceptable.

Of course bus drivers must be tip top in driving both in regulation and skill.

Those bas persiaran folks have to be equal in both vehicle quality and driving qualifications.

Have always loved bus rides.

Take it over mrt anyday.

[Xers007]

7 hours ago, mikk123 said:

i fully support with car lite. Let's start with our leaders and ministers. They got Covid-19 vaccine on national TV, so everyone else followed including me. How about they give up car on national TV, I will follow too. CAN THEY? WILL THEY? 😁 

 

no way.. based on security is already a big no no for them to go public everyday and dont forget of that 1 incident that started the doxxing law.  

[Phluvcat]

36 minutes ago, Throttle2 said:

I may not totally agree with you but your last sentence i agree.

Technically my last sentence is "Hmm..." 

😂