This blog has always been keen and passionate about public transportation for the longest time.
From the first article – “The Public Transportation Issue” written in November 2008, about 9 articles have been written. All of it can be read here.
What Malaysia needs is a world class public transportation system which can connect people efficiently, more so in the Klang Valley. The acute problem in traffic, compounded by increasing number of cars have made public transportation one of the key NKRA of Najib’s administration.
As such, the effort to upgrade the public transportation (buses, LRT, MRT, monorail etc) is paramount to alleviate the choking problem faced by the people in the capital city. Time lost by the people stuck in traffic jams costs money and opportunity loss.
Therefore, we find it vital that the public transportation especially the LRT and MRT must be the impetus in attracting the people to use public transportation.
But the news we heard today is both disappointing and alarming. It seems the Malaysian Indian Congress (MIC) is up in arms against the government in providing a better service for the general public.
Prasarana denied entry to Puchong Tamil school
PETALING JAYA: A LRT extension construction company is unhappy that its contractors were prevented from carrying out their work, by a group of MIC members and parents from Castlefield Tamil School.
Prasarana Negara Berhad (Prasarana) said it is extremely disappointed that efforts to build an LRT Line Extension Project (LEP) have been hindered by reckless actions of these individuals.
They also claimed that the individuals, who had formed a blockade in front of the school yesterday, scuffled with auxiliary policemen from the company, resulting in a senior officer being injured.
This is despite Prasarana obtaining an injunction to enter part of the school compound and informing the school authorities of the planned work to be undertaken.
“This is the third time that we have made effort to enter the site. We have stated repeatedly that we will ensure minimum interruption to the children’s studies while construction of the LEP is underway,” said Prasarana’s group director of the project development division, Zulkifli Md Yusoff.
“We are dedicated to ensuring that the well-being of the schoolchildren and their teachers are not compromised during this period. Apart from enhancing the school’s facilities, we would also ensure the safety of the children and public,” he added.
Yesterday, around 60 MIC Youth members and the parents led by former MIC Youth Chief T Mohan prevented Prasarana’s constructors from entering the school. They also urged Prasarana to sign an agreement before starting the extension work.
No need for school to be relocated
It is learnt the school administration had passed a memorandum to Prasarana for a mutual agreement where it wants the company to provide RM20 million to build a new school on six-acre plot given by Selangor state government.
However, Prasarana stressed that it is going to occupy only 0.47 acres of 2.8 acres of the school compound and upon completion of the project, the five LRT piers will only occupy 20 metres of space.
“It is important for the public to understand that LEP can coexist with the school harmoniously and there is no need for the school to be relocated for this project to commence,” said Zulkifly.
“Moreover, the Education ministry has set a requirement that 100% approval from all parents must be obtained for the relocation. But, a group of 80 parents came out to voice their disagreement,” he added.
“Prasarana will build sound-proof barriers, improve the school’s facilities, including installing air-con units in classrooms and improve the landscape by planting trees and foliage as a gesture of goodwill.
“There are many benefits to consider, the key of which is improved transport convenience for the students and surrounding residents to the greater LRT network in Klang Valley,” he said.
The 17.7km LRT extension of the Ampang line under the National Key Result Area (NKRA) would directly benefit residents in Petaling, Bandar Kinrara, Puchong and Putra Heights.
It is learnt that a 180-metre stretch passes the edge of the Castlefield school, running parallel to the Puchong Damansara Higway (LDP) and the construction of the five pillars.
MIC should be held responsible for this transgression as its unruly members are working against the government’s effort to vitalise the LRT service. Furthermore, it seems the school board of Castlefield are getting more and more greedy when all effort was given by the government to ease any hardship which may be borne by the school (giving airconds, building a hall and school facilities etc) and even throwing away RM20 million of taxpayers money just to build another school!
RM20 million of our money to be used just because of a 0.47 acres of space? The school board must be out of their mind!
God forbid if they would also want to control that RM20 million and pick their own contractors themselves!
On top of that, MIC and the school board are knowingly defying a court order. In a civilised country such as Malaysia, defying a court order will have severe repercussions. Will the leadership of MIC take responsibility over the action of their members?
All this stupidity by working against the public’s wellbeing should stop.
Castlefield Tamil School is not the first school to have a train line adjacent to it and nor will it be the last. In Malaysia, they are many schools which have similar scenario and they pose no problems for the students.
As a matter of fact, according to this report, there are several LRT lines which has been built near schools, such as:
- Sekolah Methodist Wesley, Sentul, KL
- SRJK (T) Appar, Jalan Merpati, KL
- SRJK (C) Chong Kwok, Jalan Merpati, KL
- SK (L) Jalan Batu, KL
The ball is in MIC’s court. Please get a clearer picture from both sides of the affected party. Do not be swayed by petty politics to the detriment of greater good.
As for the greedy school board, enough is enough.
jebatmustdie 
That’s what will happen when we have leaders in some BN component parties, who only sleep with the “sleeping beauties” . UMNO is trying to disengage with those dreamers who are still being possessed by their “sleeping beauties, except their wives! Najib should make an audit of all his leaders in the component parties in BN, from Perlis to Johor, from Sabah to Sarawak! Not only MIC but also the new leadership of MCA, as expected there will be endless sabotage in progress. Please open our big eyes for good and honest past leaders like Lim San Choon, Tan Koon Swan, Lee Kim Sai and perhaps Ong Tee Kiat. I believe all the Pandan Indah and Ampang voters and community of all races are backing for OTK to come back. I challenge Rafizi to go back to his constituency and boast what PKR n PR can do for the voters who had supported him in PRU13.
Please say something outside the parliament, my friend Rafizi bin Ramli if you have the guts and that goes to Lim Kit Siang in GP, Johor where the tides may go against the luck of DAP between the various factions now grabbing for power!!! Still you people want to support the DAP? Think lah and better to pledge your support and loyalty to Tuanku Sultan. I believe Tuanku will take care of all Johoreans in his own way and on his own time and convenience! Ampun Tuanku, patik mohon ampun!
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Yes, the public transportation system must be improved greatly to alleviate the humongous transportaion problems in the Klang Valley etc.
The trend of people living some 30-40 miles away from the capital like in Japan, Europe and USA has started years ago. People rely on the commuter trains. But the feeder and support service must be good. The Government must concentrate on these. And act fast, too.
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The group of MIC members and parents from Castlefield Tamil School preventing work on the LRT Line Extension Project is silly to say the least, irresponsible and despicable to say more.
How can they do that sort of stupid acts. Is there any basis at all for asking the contractors to sign an agreement to provide facilities for those attending the school? Doesn’t the land belong to the Federal Government – the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry has the discretion on relocating the school?
Is this the case of some silly fellows trying to be smart? Should get Anwar Al Juburi to deal with them. From the rear. After all, although MIC, they appear to be behaving PR or Anwar style, protesting here, protesting there, even on stupid grounds like wanting a win by the so-called popular votes at PRU13. And the bloke has more time to deal on Malaysian issues now that he has been refused entry into Japan the other day.
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The tamils should be angry. They have been ethnically cleansed from ktm. And they need to tell the gomen that they need to get some tamils to work in the lrt.
SPAD and new mrt is a hp6, haprak, 3/4 organisations. Whoever planned this extension obviously have never riden the putra line before. Even now, with the lines so short, those boarding at stations nearer to KL will find it difficult to get into the trains during peak hours. Now with twice the length, no chance at all.
And the new MRT curently being built along the Kajang to Sungai buloh are built alongside major highways. The passengers alighting and boarding buses/cars at the junctions to get to the stations will cause a serious jam. MRT is supose to alleviate jams,not create and make jams worse. MRT should divert cars/ buses away from highways to clear the roads. Dummies!
And what about those from pj who wants to go klia? Why don’t ERL or ktm build cnew rail to connect putra heights to KLIA? ERL can easily do this by building putra heights to putrajaya/ cyberjaya station. Or they need to pay another few million to con- sultants to even figure this out.
Fade up with this brain dead bureaucrats we have. They should all be in jail and water board as they have failed consistently. They obviously not thinking and working hard enough.
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Yes the tamils from the last century have been ethnically cleansed from being cheap labourers maintaining the KTM railways and now most of them are lawyers, or working in GLCs. Some even became doctors! *Gasp*
Don’t be demented.
Thank you.
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Agree with you JMD. Our mistake was treating these immigrants and their descendent as if their are like us. I hope we all take stock and have a closer look at them see and them for what they are. No more no less.
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I say, stu, does it not occur to your blasted mind at all that those responsible for the LRT line has had some studies done? There are many parties involved, ranging from those in the government to those in the private sector submitting the proposal, to those engineers and others who evaluate the proposals and those approving it.
You must have a warped mind, demented thinking or plain stupid to assume that none of them would have raised the matter if no such studies were done and the LRT alignment and design be tailored accordingly.
And you are just alone, you think you know better than them? What a load of bullshit you are talking.
Don’t you know that traffic studies are constantly being reviewed by the experts with the steady rise in the population of the country? Do you know that there are those qualified and experienced specifically in traffic studies who get commissioned to carry out relevant research and studies from time to time?
Do you have an Engineering or relevant qualification and experience to even start blabbering your loud mouth? From the shit you put out in your comment, I don’t think you do. You are more of the DAP/ Pakatoon goon who simply says what you want any time you want. Sad for you, you cannot do so any more without being challenged or shitted at.
And the usual wild accusations, full of opinions, empty on facts. You have a gangster or a terrorist mind, haven’t you? I think asking you to jump into the South China Sea for saying those is quite in order.
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Transportation system in any city, in any country, must be an integrated one. Roads, railways, toll highways, subways, LRTs etc. Serving for and by cars. lorries, taxis, commuter trains, long-haul mail trains and the like.
Those are on land. Others are in the air and in the sea. Passengers and cargoes must also be served and linked from the airport, the sea port, terminals of all sorts to various destinations.
Studies on one mode of transport are rarely independent of the others. It can even be futile to study locations of LRT stations without regard for the kind of traffic in the area, the needs of the residents they are designed to serve.
So, criticising “the lines so short .. difficult to get into the trains during peak hours ..” without checking the overall plans, those not yet implemented etc, is not smart. Go to super efficient, damn hard working Japan and you’ll find they continuously have commuter train guards help literally push and shove passengers into trains at peak hours.
Even when all the developments for a particular period have been carried out, allowances must be given for increasing needs that exceed expectation due to several factors that escape forecasts, like economic booms. Goodness, even London, the city least chaotic in terms of traffic jams, has traffic problems from time to time. The London Mayor Boris Johnson even bicycles to and from work to help alleviate the problem.
Anyone here cares to pool cars to go to work daily? Or use public transportation to work? But I suspect the school board referred to above won’t. They aren’t even concerned that the LRT being constructed is for solving the city’s transport problem.
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“RM20 million of our money to be used just because of a 0.47 acres of space (out of 2.8 acres the school has)? The school board must be out of their mind!” –
This is a case of trying to be clever, resulting in being seen as not smart, greedy and unreasonable. The whole story of being ungrateful ingrates all over again. Of exploitation, of wanting more and more, of not not seeing the big picture, of not caring for the interest of the public at large, for whom the LRT is being built.
They’ll demand all sorts, yet will not give anything to the country at all. They’ll always say, “Give me what I want” and probably have never heard the expression, “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”
And that’s not even their own personal property – it’s the school property, yet they are intransigent. What kind of narrow mindedness and stinking selfishness is all that?
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The School board defying a Court Order – just arrest them. Teach them and other law breakers in this country some lessons. If they don’t respect the Court and the law, why the hell should the authorities respect them? The authorities need to show they mean business. Protect the sanctity of the court and govern in a manner such that they would not be taken for granted or belittled.
Like the DAP. Not respecting the Registrar of Societies. The very authority in existence for scores of years to regulate the various organizations in the country. Not enough with not obeying the instructions of the RoS, they even dared to threaten to sue the RoS. Ruffians, gangster-like Cina Bukit. De-register the DAP.
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I like to think that the MIC Youth members and the parents were led by the former MIC Youth Chief who became “former” because of no being voted again due to his mentality and behaviour. Good that he no longer leads the MIC Youth but not good that he can still cause a nuisance by trying to prevent the contractors from doing the MRT construction work.
Unless the bloke has resigned from MIC, the MIC leadership has to take responsibility for the stupid, anti-national work. The least they could do is denounce the act of those blokes as not being associated with MIC so that they could be looked at as ruffians and common criminals.
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Sure, what Malaysia needs is a world class public transportation system which can connect people efficiently, especially in the Klang Valley.
Bu we must realize that Rome was not built in a day. Hundreds, thousands of years, in fact. London, Paris, Nw York and ll the big cities in the world have been developed over hundreds of years. Goodness, Malaysia became independent only 56 years ago. The British colonial rulers before independence were not really interested in development beyond getting the maximum in revenues to be sent back to England.
Since independence we have myriad of trunk roads, Federal roads, State roads, highways, super highways. Multi-tiered higways, too – go to certain inter-sections and you’ll see the 3-4 levels of roads having been built, giving the impression this is like Tokyo, New York etc.
But let’s shout at the MIC fellows who care not the convenience of the public, just being obsessed with their self interest and not thinking out of the small box they may be in.
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JMD,
Kerenah manusia ini tak kira bangsa…semuanya sama saja. Eloknya di Malaysia ni kerajaan kuku besi atau pun kerajaan komunis (safalis la).. baru semua projek kerajaan boleh berjalan. Masa tu baru padan muka
diorang yg keras kepala ni.
Pemimpin kita ni berlembut tak bertempat. Hah rasakan la.
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wow….wondering why umno is still in cohort with the non performing mic and mca. they cling to the malay votes, and still have the balls to kick umno in the teeth..syabas umno.,!
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