Conclusion

The problem of this research report is ‘too many vehicles.’ This problem has became one of the main issues in Singapore today and will definitely get worse in the future. As a result, a major action has to be done in order to overcome the problem. After doing multiple primary and secondary researches both micro and macroly, this report contains a deep understanding and analysis that is necessary for solving the research problem.

In order to decrease the amount of vehicles in Singapore, brainstorming was done on different solutions and developed them into one final solution that would work best. This research report produced a final solution which is to create a new public transport that would not add more congestion to the roads and would become the most preferable transportation in Singapore.

The final solution is called the BMRT, which is derived from two existing public transportations in Singapore which are bus and MRT. The BMRT is a transportation that has the capacity and routing system of a bus and has the railtrack and speed like MRT. Therefore, BMRT would make a perfect public transport that is more convenient, safer, faster, and eco-friendly. In conclusion, by creating BMRT, people would not need to use their private cars to go to places because they could just take the BMRT instead.

A2 Presentation Board

Car Free Day will be held twice a year, and will car users must use other ways to travel for be a public holiday. This is held in order to example walking, skating, biking, and persuade people to use more public taking public transportation. We suggest transport than private cars. On this day, all people to use public transport especially cars will be banned in the country and all BMRT because it will be the best public transportation in Singapore. It is faster, it is safer, it is more convenient, and it is more eco-friendly than any other transportations. By holding this event, more people will use BMRT and less people will use their private cars. Therefore, it will reduce the amount of vehicles in Singapore which will result in the improvement of traffic flow, increase the productivity of Singapore’s economy, and improve the quality of lives.

Features of the Solution

Car Free Day Poster
Taking this day to introduce BMRT as well.

BMRT details

Where will the BMRT be Built?
 It would be built along the side road so it will not interfere other vehicles way
(the same as the routes of buses)

BMRT Station with its system

Exiting a BMRT

Entering a BMRT

How to Board a BMRT

How does the BMRT operate?

How does a BMRT operate? It operates by using an advanced computer system found on a MRT which is electrically powered by solar panels and have a numbering system like the one on buses today so one could go to  a more specific destination. On the BMRT station, it has a system which one could choose which BMRT one would like to board on. Once the number has been selected, a BMRT would arrive in less than a minute. Upon entering or alighting the BMRT, one would be asked to tap his Ez-link card. To stop at a station, one simply has to press the stop button. As for the BMRT, the lanes are branched out into two while nearing a station. It would go to the second lane (below lane) if it is supposed to stop there. If not, it will go directly to the next station.

Development

An approach of combining and improving ideas into an ideal solution is carried out in this step. The two ideas that are chosen are car free day and increasing the quality and quantity of public transportation. We chose these two ideas because they support each other and will work mutually. By not allowing people to use their private cars for a day, they are forced to use other transportations. By conducting a car free day, car users are encouraged to use public transport and more and more car users will realize that public transport is not bad.

PROs	CONs
No private cars on the road, no traffic	Not efficient
Eco-friendly	Tiring for car users
More comfortable public transport

How do we improve the quality of public transportation?

Improving the quality of a transport, nonetheless a public transport, could be very difficult. It would mean a period of time without them and people complaining about how they would go to work or anywhere they want.

With this reason, a new public transportation would be built though it would take a whole lot of time to get it done. Reasons of it is because public transportation nowadays are overcrowded, they run slow and fares are rising to an extend than never before. With these understanding, a hope of building a safe, eco-friendly, fast, convenient with cheap fare public transportation would be made. Also, a transport that could avoid traffic in any possible way.

Convenient: Most people would want something convenient. Meaning a transportation that is flexible to go around anywhere. For example, the bus

Fast: Time is important for everyone especially workers. People would want to travel faster what with the amount of time they could spend doing something productive. For example, MRT

Eco-Friendly: With the numbers of vehicles there are around the world, the amount of pollution garnered are even worse than decades ago. If the air around is unpolluted, one would unlikely to faint or feel anxious.

Cheap: These days, fare prices are risen.

Improving on buses or MRT system might be less complicated than building a new system. However, these transportations have different aspects towards their own. Buses, they are convenient but they are more likely to be caught in a traffic jam than MRT will. MRT on the other hand, travels fast but it is not as convenient as buses are. It could not go anywhere specific and if one was to alight from an MRT station, he/she would be bound to walk a few blocks to his destination.

Design of the BMRT ride

With these reasons, we want to build something that is a combination of the bus, MRT and cable car and came up with BMRT, which is as convenient as a bus and runs as fast as the MRT and does not take up much space as the cable car. Each BMRT would have the same capacity number (approx. 50) and dimension ( 1.1m x 3m x 2.5m) as buses have.

Layout Plan of the BMRT Ride

Sketches

Based on the researches and analyses that have been conducted, it can be said that many of the traffic congestion is due to the high demands of vehicles, which made productions go higher - making public transport deserted by society. Because of this reason, these five ideas were chosen as probable solutions to the matter ‘Too Many Vehicles’. The advantages and disadvantages of these solutions are also stated on each idea.

Pros and Cons of Every Idea

Top 5 Solutions

1. Design of a Vehicle

Comparison of Car Sizes

A design of a vehicle is really crucial whether in selling or marketing and also engineering. And it is believed that an average sized car takes up a lot of space on a road, moreover there are a lot of cars owned in an area. One could imagine how congested it would be. That is why a change on a car’s design is needed. That also means an alteration on the engines - changing it into an all-electric, rechargeable power system, system that avoids hitting other vehicles and could also navigate on its own.

PROs	CONs
Space efficient	Lack of space for movement
Improve air quality	Max carry up to 4 persons
Reduce accidents among cars
Stabil quantity of fossil fuel

2. Car Free Day

According to The Washington Post, the event "promotes improvement of mass transit, cycling and walking, and the development of communities where jobs are closer to home and where shopping is within walking distance". This is to make people realize their environment, of how hectic their lives have been.

One Day Without Gasoline

PROs	CONs
Eco-friendly	Tiring
No traffic around	Not time efficient
People are encouraged to walk and cycle more

3. Increase Public Transport Quality & Quantity

Public transports’ quality in some countries is not taken care in a maximal way. Perhaps because of the degrading in the quality is what makes people purchase a car for their personal use. And might as well be due to the wait time to catch a ride. Quality improvement like comfortable seats, improving engines, cutting down the fare price, etc should be considered.

Cycle of Public Transport

PROs	CONs
people will be encouraged to use public transport more	not as efficient as using private car
decrease in traffic	expensive (maintenance)
eco-friendly
more comfortable

4. Vehicle-Color-Based Day

There are a lot colors provided for a car’s design and the majority of them is either black or white/silver. By allowing only certain car colors on a certain day, it is expected to cause less traffic.

MON	TUE	WED	THU	FRI	WEEKENDS

Everyday Color-Based Chart

PROs	CONs
less traffic	Hard to organize
Colorful	Not efficient for car users

Ideas for Solutions

Before focusing on one ideal/ specific solution, a number of solutions should be considered by brainstorming, whether realistic or not (picture above). These 101 solutions were then cut down to five ideas. Though some might be absurd, they could be developed into something innovative, while the remainders are ideas that have been applied by other subjects.

Singapore's Government's Actions

Work of an ERP

In Singapore, the government plays an active role in the lives of its citizens. Dealing with traffic jams has become a major concern to the government. Even though traffic jams are still present in today’s time, there are a lot of things that the government has done to reduce traffic.

The approach that the government of Singapore chose to deal with traffic is by providing an efficient public transport system. Singapore has a lot of public transport service including MRT, SMRT, and taxi. These public transports complement each other and really makes travelling in Singapore much more effective and efficient. The MRT is suitable for far distance travels, the SMRT is suitable for specific-destination travels, and taxi is more for personal and custom travels. In addition, improvements for public transport in Singapore are always conducted annually including new MRT lines, more buses, and more trains.  

Other than public transport, another approach that has been chosen by the government of Singapore to reduce the congestion of traffic is road pricing. This is probably the most important and efficient solution that has been successfully reduced the amount of traffic. Singapore was the first country in the world to apply the approach of increasing road pricing to manage vehicle demand. It started in 1975 under the title of Area Licensing System (ALS).

The last approach that has been done by the government is improving the infrastructure of the roads of Singapore. Singapore has a very high-maintenance in its infrastructure and there is almost no damaged road in Singapore. In addition, Singapore never stops improving and building more roads, expressways, bridges, and walkways to compensate the growth of Singapore’s population.

Facts on 'Too Many Vehicles'

countries with most cars

China being one of the developing countries, has been one that imported the most cars with a total of approximately 18,350,000 units. Following it is USA.  A whole lot of countries manufacture cars in thinking that they would have huge incomes. This is true, but, unconsciously, they do not realize that they are endangering their people as well. In addition, these countries, have the most number of populations around the world. Humans are born everyday and there are a lot of people who are at that closing to that age (teens) where they would want to own a car. Think about it, a growth in population along with the increasing number of cars. This would certainly cause massive traffic.

The growth of vehicles population in Singapore has been increasing gradually over the past decade from 706,956 to 969,910 with private cars outnumbering every other vehicle. With the number this big, it is no wonder that road traffic happens on every corner of the city. Singapore alone produces vehicles as much as 1000 and the number of new car registering is approximately 47,555 annually, excluding imported vehicles and other public transports. If compared to the growth of Singapore’s population, the ratio reached between the increase of population and the number of vehicles is of 5:1, five times as much. While population increased slightly over 10% in 10 years, the number of vehicles rose over 20% through the period. This means that demands of cars are slowly getting out of hand and could possibly lead to an overflow of vehicles. Imagine a country like Singapore, one of the smallest, being occupied by a huge number of people and vehicles.

Solution to A Traffic

There are more than a handful of solutions out there that have been either conducted or suggested over the years. But are they capable of reducing traffic? That is the real question.

A study in Korea stated that there are two types of drivers: optimistic, those who leave little space in-between cars, and defensive, those who leave a more than necessary gap in-between. And that traffic occurs when these two drivers are traveling on the same route. This has been demonstrated by mathematical models and concluded that traffic would clear up only when optimistic drivers are leaving the jam and defensive drivers are arriving.

Undoubtedly, Korean roads are modern and well signposted

What have they come up with? An automated on-board control.
It is a system which could notify drivers of upcoming traffic so they could gradually slow down and increase distance from cars ahead. It would also accelerate the speed of a leaving car more by using automated cruise control. With vehicles cruising faster than they arrive, congestion would dissolve eventually.

The system is based on a medical initiative, Asthmapolis, which has implanted simple and clever tracking system to identify and determine where an inhaler would be used. This helps users in avoiding high-risk zones and detect when the attack will occur. An advance notice.

See more at: http://www.digitalforreallife.com/2011/11/say-goodbye-to-traffic-jams/#sthash.nJvMrnpY.dpuf
Read more about Korean driving habits: https://asadalthought.wordpress.com/tag/korean-traffic/ (img source)

Traffic in Singapore

Compared to the number of vehicles available in Singapore few decades ago, today the number has multiplied significantly. As a result, traffic has become a common problem in Singapore, not only to car drivers but also to pedestrians and public transportation users.

Traffic in Singapore has become inevitable since the intervention of technology. The world is battling against each other in order to create the perfect ‘machine’. And this is why demands of these machines never fail to cease, which leads us to a huge number of imported goods available in Singapore.

With many cars along the roads, it is good to know the time when congestion occurs or when the peak hours are. For example, Singapore’s daily traffic volume is recorded between 7:30am-7:00pm on weekdays only. Based on the results, the busiest period it between 8:00am to 9:00am and 6:00pm-7:00pm on weekdays as they are the usual times people go on and off of work.  And there is no traffic between 1 to 5am. Clementi is the worst suburb for morning commuting with Bukit Timah, Bishan and Jurong West coming in second, third and fourth consecutively.

By highlighting areas affected by congestion, the purpose is to enable people to consider alternative routes and departure times.

img source : TomTom.com

Traffic as it is

What is the cause of traffic? Too many vehicles. Humans. Unlimited Demands.

Production of vehicles in increasing year by year since the innovation of cars started. Now we have over 60 million cars (and counting) cars (motor vehicle) produced today. That means  165,000 new cars produced everyday. No wonder traffic is almost everywhere.

When one is stuck in traffic, certainly, he/she will feel anxious as they are late for work or school and that is when the blood pressure rises. One could also experience a back pain/joint stiffness, being in a car for hours sitting on the same position. You could not stretch for a minute in a car as for the compact space. Moreover, the honking of vehicles could cause mental stress that could cause disturbance in work, even when relaxing/sleeping. This could be bad for health mentally and physically. To top it off, one could lose the time spent with their family, friends, the time to have fun to hours stuck in traffic. This could also lead to mental stress, heart diseases.

With so many cars on a road, it could lead to road damage - the mass weight of the vehicles making it over limiting the maximum pressure it could hold, causing cracks, uneven surfaces. Government would spend much money to repair it and if this keep happening, taxes would eventually increase. Most definitely, no one would want that. What would you do then?

img source: biketoworkblog.com

Fossil Fuel

Everything that needs ignitions would likely need oil, but it is running out. Is there any alternative resources out there?

Beside the use of fossil fuel and its benefits into our lives, its consummation is getting out of control. Oil use in unequal: USA consumes about 22 barrels of oil a person annually while in some developing countries consummation is as low as 3 barrels of oil a person annually.

Fossil fuel has many disadvantages but confusingly, people do not realize that or it is because they just do not care at all. Look at our environment now. It is used to be green and filled with refreshing air. But now, it is covered with pollution; whether it is air or water. It is disrupting out way of living.

Air pollution for one, is damaging our bodies. Fossil fuel emits gaseous pollutants which are toxic to our heart and lungs, growing cancer to them. It is also damaging our atmosphere, especially the ozone layer which has the role of protecting our earth from UV rays harmful against our skin.

These gases also plays a role in polluting the water. First the gases emitted go to our atmosphere and precipitate the dry disposition of them. They can also stick in cloud water and when it rains it would pour the dispositions into out earth, causing acid rain, fog, snow, uncommon weather to an area. These deleterious chemical reaction then endanger the aquatic life as well as the pH of the ground. Think of it like this, we eat vegetables and meats. Once their lives are unbalanced and we eat them unknowingly. Eventually, we are the ones who would get sick. It is a chain reaction.

img source: diskordchicago.com

Case Study - Details

China is considered one of the busiest country in the world being a tourist city with over 2.23 million inhabitants (still growing). Because of the inevitable growth in the population, numbers of vehicles owned are also inevitably uprising as many of them buy a vehicle as soon as they get a driver’s license. Also, with no increase in road capacity as well as support of public transportations (low speed traffic flows), traffic congestion has become one of the main problem in China.

Some approaches they have considered adopting are effective but some are also ineffective. They focus on three instruments (physical, market and regulatory) such as improving public transport facilities, enlarging public buses system greatly, building a MRT, intelligent signal control system, completing urban road skeleton planning and urban transit network layout if they could successfully conduct all of them.

Comparison of Cars, Bus and Bicycle Capacity vs Space Occupied

On the other hand, though solutions like enlarging government subsidies, expanding urban development space, may likely to succeed, consequences are to be considered beforehand. Increasing capacity roads means that road are built on rural areas, people would hardly have a day of serenity. Despite it decreasing the traffic in the central, more people may want to travel through those new built roads and some still on the central. If this is the case, there would be more traffic than ever. Upon achieving these approaches, of course, a certain sum of money is necessary from government which means a rise on taxes.

img source: teeheehee.bostonbiker.org

Case Studies

In understanding more about the traffic happening in Singapore, conducting case studies from different countries helps a lot. Here are some of them:

Buncheon City, Korea

Problems:

·      A city inhabited by nearly 900,000 people, four major institutions of higher education, a symphony orchestra and several notable public gardens that host annual festivals.

·      Lack insight to reduce traffic congestion and slow in reciprocating traffic incidents

·      Traffic data is often inaccurate. Monitoring traffic flow is from closed circuit tv video which is counted manually.

Solutions:

Using intelligent video analytics to provide real-time traffic information to drivers to avoid congestion, conduct traffic surveillance and improve city roads.

Hangzhou, China

·      A tourist city with 2.23 million people living there and growing, uprising of the number of vehicles

·      Many of them buy vehicles as soon as they get a driver license

·      No increase in road capacity

·      Public transportations run less efficiently and are mixed with low speed of traffic flows

·      No Mass Rapid Transit

·      Lack in parking spaces, people roam around the road

Solutions

·      Perfecting public transport facilities

Improving station facilities
Improving urban junctions of park and shift

Improving urban intelligent public traffic system

·      Perfecting public transport operating structures

Enlarging public buses system greatly Developing urban rail transit orderly
Developing Large-capacity rapid bus moderately

·      Ensuring the road use priority rights of the public transport
Settling bus priority lane and bus priority intelligent signal control system scientifically.

Improving management of bus priority lane and bus priority intelligent signal control system

·      Enlarging government subsidies (State council, 2005)

·      Highlighting status of central city, setting the stage for expanding of urban future’s development space

·      Completing urban road skeleton planning and urban rail transit network layout planning

DKI Jakarta, Indonesia

Problems:

·      Around 1.1 million trips were made everyday from suburban to central Jakarta

·      Unavailability of comfortable public transportation system ® lack of intermodal integration

·      Subsidized gasoline price, concentrated economic growth

·      Difficulty in land acquisition

·      Difficulty of coordination among local governments

·      Non-transparent transportation policymaking process

Lower income and lower standard of living ® subsidy for gasoline ® lack of budget of investment ® lack of public transportation investment ®use of private cars and motorcycles ® congestion ®lower efficiency and productivity; loss of competitiveness ® lower income and lower standard of living

Solutions:

·      Begun operation of the BRT system (Bus Rapid Transport)

·      Three-in-one

·      Monorail

·      Commuter line

·      Implement the recently passed law on Land acquisition for public use

·      MRT system

·      ERP (Electronic Road Pricing system)

·      Bike-to-work motto

More readings about other countries' problems and solutions:

http://www.slideshare.net/RCha/case-study-of-traffic-management-in-cambridge-uk

http://gccbs2013.aast.edu/newgcc/images/pdf/traffic%20congestion%20sustainable%20sotlutions%20mass%20transportation.pdf
http://www.internationaltransportforum.org/IntOrg/ecmt/urban/Tokyo05/Yap.pdf

http://www.esc-pau.fr/ppp/documents/featured_projects/thailand.pdf

http://www.nationmultimedia.com/politics/Half-baked-solutions-will-not-ease-Bangkoks-traff-30217071.html