>THE taxi service is looking chronically problematic. A new operating procedure that took effect in the Central Business District on March 1 made taxi stands and the vehicle driveways of commercial buildings the only points at which commuters could board and get off taxis. No more road-side hailing and alighting. This change was made on the orders of the Land Transport Authority (LTA), which cited 'public safety' to justify the massive disruption. The designating of more bus-only lanes was also a factor, the LTA has said. The plan looked fine on paper. It was also a part-response to the perennial complaint that taxis were hard to get in the CBD. (This has improved after the fares hike.) But the experience after only two weeks has been edifying. A first-class row has erupted. Businesses in buildings not served by taxi stands fret about a decline in custom. Office workers in quieter areas are having to walk a distance to get to the nearest stands, if they can locate one. Business visitors and tourists are bewildered. Taxi drivers get scolded. Many are cheesed off. Conclusion: The plan was under-researched. Taxi stands were wholly under-provided for the wholesale change in habits demanded.
The LTA has two choices. The easier option is to suspend the ruling or, as it puts it, to be 'flexible' in implementing it, until it has built many more stands than the extra ones it has provided. This could end up prolonging the agony. The harder option is to scrap the plan as being impractical. There is no shame in conceding it had been wrong in wanting to be helpful. What it should not be doing is to stick doggedly to its guns when the judgment of the public and taxi drivers is that the plan is not working as intended. Public annoyance can only get worse if it persists, even after regular riders have acquainted themselves with the locations of stands.
Basics have to be acknowledged. The primary one which planners seemed to have overlooked is that Singapore is not a city made for a taxi-stand-only model. This can work only in off-the-beaten-track places where every resident drives a car and visitors are few. Taxis would be a supplement. Singapore is an international intersection. Its city centre teems with office workers, working visitors, tourists and local shoppers who need prompt door-to-door service. They should not be made to conform to an unworkable plan. Unless the LTA's studies can pinpoint many more locations for stands, it should drop the ruling quietly - just as the design of slippery, sloping metal benches pitched too high in MRT stations was quietly corrected following consumer feedback. The CBD is too big an area to be dotted with stands every 300m.
