By MATTHEW VARI
Sunday, February 1, 2015 (Sunday Chronicle, PNG)
THE public transport system in the National Capital District has been labeled as being disjointed and confusing.
NCD Governor Powes Parkop expressed frustration on the commission’s part that the public motor vehicle function still remained with the national government through the Transport Department and its agencies.
He said the expectation by the general public was that the commission was at fault was one that was common, however, he added that with the many traffic organizations and registration authorities were not doing their job to remedy all issues related to their responsibilities.
“You all must appreciate that sometimes I get backlash for everyone’s failures, there is an assumption that as governor I control everything in our city,” Governor Parkop explained.
“But to be honest we do not as there are functions that are national and are disjointed- for example we build the roads, we maintain it but someone else collects the fees.”
“There are one or two traffic authorities in the city, the National Road Safety Council who put up roadblocks, and when you go to another part of the city there is Central Province Traffic Authority, then you have the Police putting roadblocks, so we have a number of them here.”
He said the municipal government has no powers or control over them, and likewise the situation with public transport is a function that is still retained by the national government with the national land transport board has authority over the city.
“Look at what they have done, they are doing nothing with a plan for the future, as you all can see we are doing our best to try and improve it,” Parkop said.
“We have the big buses for a while now, but the Land Transport board did not want to give us a permit for a while and we had no choice but to run it for free, we cannot sustain a reliable long term operation so we only operate it at peak hours in the morning and in the afternoon.”
“If we were collecting all monies from registrations then probably we could be running the entire transport system, or we are getting registrations from taxis and PNV but we are not getting income from users.”
He also referred to preparation for the city’s PMV system for the South Pacific Games in July, which he said the agencies in charge have not done anything worth noting of the being ready.
“Up to now Land Transport Board has done nothing to prepare the system for the games, but what I want to say is that we are going to be getting 20 buses so we will use that for the game they will operate around the city to pick up anybody who wants to go to the game and it will be free,” he said.
“We will be putting out an expression of interest soon to design a new, efficient, more affordable public transport system into the future.”
“I cannot be complacent and wait for some people to wake up from their slumber so the expression will go out soon.”
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