Content area
Full Text
Urban traffic congestion is usually the result of a mismatch between the supply of infrastructure for transportation and demand for the use of this infrastructure by an ever-increasing vehicle population. Studies have clearly shown tbat urban traffic congestion undermines the growth of a city by inhibiting its ability to attract the people and businesses essential for maintaining or improving its level of prosperity.
Singapore is a city-state with a land area of only 620 square kilometers with no natural resources. Its survival and yrosperity depends heavily on its efficiency and ability to attract multinational corporations to use Singapore as their base for operations in the Asia-Pacific region. The government, since its independence, gave top priority to the provision of an efficient infrastructure. This paper will outline the steps taken by the Singapore govemment in achieving a smooth and reliable transportation system to ensure the efficient mobility of people and goods.
OVERALL LAND TRANSPORT POLICY
The overall land transport policy requires that the role of transportation planning be considered an integral component of comprehensive land use and urban planning and that all transportation infrastructure and services be viewed as a total coordinated system. The minister responsible for communication and transportation, Dr Yeo Ning Hong, outlined the government's policy as follows:
In broad terms, our overall land transportation policy consists of... systematic town planning... building the best possible network oC roads and expressways ... and managing our roads for optimum traffic flow... giving priority to public transport... managing private vehicles by keeping their growth and usage undercheck. [1]
The following sections will examine some of the innovative measures taken by the government over the last twenty years to minimize traffic congestion as part of its integrated transportation policy. These measures mainly fall into three categories: policies restraining car ownership, car usage, and encouraging usage of public transportation as an altemative to owning and using automobiles.
CAR OWNERSHIP CONTROL
OWNERSHIP COSTS
Singapore's roads and expressways currently occupy nearly ten percent of the republic's land and has one of the highest densities of roads per square kilometer in the world. However, additional road building and road widening is not an effective solution to traffic problems. It has been the experience of most cities that more roads are an...