Traffic consultants on fumes

The consultant, Parsons Brinckerhoff (PB), has indicated that the cost is likely to be in the range $116 to $136 million per kilometre of railway line. The Government is expected to award the rapid rail contract by December 2006, and system planning will then begin. As stated by PB, the public is not to expect rail service until the next five years. What will happen to road users until then?

According to the Central Statistical Office, between 1965 and 1995, the average annual increase in registered vehicles was 5,000 vehicles per year. Since that time to now, the average annual increase in registered vehicles has been almost 20,000 vehicles per year. The current recorded total number of registered vehicles is more than 400,000, with an annual growth rate of about ten percent. Therefore, if the economic boom continues, we might have more than 500,000 vehicles in the country in five year’s time.

My hypothesis is that there are many more vehicles operating on the roads than recorded. In 1996, a useful method that the Licensing Office had in ensuring that vehicles were registered annually was removed. Up until that time, vehicles had to be registered annually, and in order to do so, up-to-date vehicle insurance had to be shown. Today, only trucks, taxis and maxis have to be registered annually, while new private cars do not register until five years, and then every three years thereafter. But because of extremely poor field enforcement by both licensing office and traffic police, I suspect that there are not only many unregistered vehicles on the road, but many un-insured ones as well! Have we not commented in amazement when passing an obviously un-roadworthy vehicle ambling along the highway, especially at night?

But back to my subject, analysis by PB of vehicle and person trips in Port-of-Spain, San Fernando and Chaguanas shows an average number of persons occupying a vehicle during peak morning and evening hours is 2.50 persons per vehicle, and ranges from 2.26 to 2.86. These vehicles include taxis, maxi-taxis and buses. It should therefore be quite clear that a very significant amount of vehicles on the roads during the peak hours have only the driver as occupant.

Total number of employed persons in Trinidad is just over 600,000. If it is assumed that these persons all travel to work during the morning peak period (of course some work shifts and would not normally be included), this translates into overall traffic on the roads in Trinidad of the order of 210,000 to 265,000 vehicles during the peak period.

Traffic congestion is only relieved when the numbers of vehicles in the traffic stream are reduced drastically. I postulate that in the Trinidad situation, 30 to 40 percent have to be removed from our roadways, at least during peak hours. That is, transit usage has to be between 60 and 70 percent, as in countries that have successful transit systems. In other words, we have to find a way to persuade 60,000 to 100,000 drivers to not use their vehicles, particularly during peak hours. Or, up to 150,000 vehicles by the year 2011 – the year of the rapid rail!

Can rapid rail do it, and if so, can it be cost effective and sustainable as a strategy? Up until 1996, 60 percent of workers in Trinidad travelled by public transit — bus, maxi-taxi, taxi, PH — that was still almost exclusively unsubsidised, unsupported, and totally unmanaged by Government. Anywhere else in the world the government would have been proud of such a transit usage.

According to Parsons, in the East West Corridor between PoS and Arima, where slightly less than 40 percent of the workforce reside, only about 40 percent of all peak hour travellers currently use public transit, aided by Government policy which continues to favour private car ownership. For the rest of the country, just about 30 percent of all peak hour travellers currently use public transit.

Most people will simply not give up the comfort and convenience of their cars, despite the huge traffic congestion being both caused and experienced by them, except if penalties are imposed on them as a congestion alleviation device to coerce them to change their mode of transport. In other words, we may be silently supporting rapid rail, because we want it for the next person, not us!

My rough analysis has shown that for a successful transit system in Trinidad, suitable provision has to be made for at least 360,000 persons (excluding secondary school children, who will be discussed at another time). In terms of road travel, this would require the overhauling of the arbitrary operations of buses, maxis, taxis, PH, and the proliferation of on-street maxi and taxi stands all over the island.

It would mean the introduction, planning and scheduling, and management of 15,000 to 40,000 transit vehicles of a mix of modes suitable to the demands and communities served. If a PoS San Fernando passenger ferry is also introduced, then the road mix may be appropriately reduced. The bottom line is that there are simple, local, and yet scientifically robust solutions available, if sought.

e-mail: lfsystems@carib-link.net