Media Statement
Penang Port chairman's call for expanded ferry service makes sense
Penang Port executive chairman Ahmad ibni Hajar said rather than spending so much on an additional link, it would be better for the state government to help buy more ferries to ease traffic congestion on the island and on the Penang Bridge.
He said new ferries would help reduce the waiting time from 12 minutes to 5 minutes. "Besides, with additional ferries plying along the channel, people will have an option not to use the Penang Bridge," he added.
Ahmad said that PPSB planned to buy five new fully vehicular ferries and five new speedboats to cater to passengers if it could get RM125 million from the state government. "They (the state government) say the port should purchase the ferries but PPSB is unable to do so because we are losing money every year," he said.
It is puzzling why the government cannot find RM125 million to subsidise the purchase of new ferries, each of which costs only RM14 million, when it is willing to spend RM2.6 billion on an additional link. Equally puzzling are PPSB's losses of RM7 million annually in running the ferry service despite the huge volume of cross-channel traffic. Perhaps this is because only six ferries are available now - not enough to generate revenue to cover overheads.
If the Penang Port is unable to run the ferry service efficiently, it should revamp its management. Alternatively, the Penang state government should consider taking over and placing the management of the ferry service under a special public transport agency.
Assuming the Penang Port does buy the additional ferries, we have to be wary of any attempt to privatise the whole service to vested interests after that.
The high-speed passenger boats suggestion sounds feasible, especially if the passenger terminals can be linked to LRT systems on both the island and the mainland. In the long run, it might be feasible to also build a cross-channel LRT link. The location for this link, however, should be thoroughly studied and there shouldn't be any hasty attempt to tie it to the southern link that the government is adamant on pushing through.
In fact, an expanded ferry service at a cost of only RM125 million - linked eventually to an overland LRT system - makes far more sense than an exorbitant RM2.6 billion cross-channel road link that would only flood the island with more private vehicles.
| |||||||||||||||
Aliran supports the statement by the executive chairman of Penang Port Sdn Bhd calling for Penang's Third Link project to be scrapped and for the ferry service to be expanded instead.