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PM mulls AI, privatisation in public transport overhaul

by Sheria Brathwaite
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Prime Minister Mia Mottley has set out proposals to revamp the public transport network, with artificial intelligence at the heart of plans to optimise bus routes and a new Mass Transit Authority to regulate a fully privatised transit system.

 

Just days before the Transport Board celebrates its 70th anniversary on Sunday, when it began a 24-year period of state takeover of private concessionaires, the prime minister was again touting the privatisation of the bus company under a new regulator.

 

Speaking at the St John edition of the Ideas Forum on Monday night, Mottley said the Ministry of Transport “has an obligation, in my view, to be able to carry us to the next level and to be able to see what is the optimisation of bus routes in this country that are not simply in and out of city”.

 

Framing the issue as part of a larger vision for decentralised services, the prime minister challenged the traditional model of bus travel centred on Bridgetown.

 

“That is how we grew up, because everything was forced to come back down to town,” she said. “But the reality is that this party which I lead especially has been the party from the beginning of decentralisation.”

 

The prime minister did not reveal when last she took the bus. But she cited the government’s decision to restore rural clinics in parishes like St Joseph and St Andrew, and its support for district magistrates’ courts, as examples of efforts to bring services closer to people where they live.

 

“There are people who say that all magistrates’ court should be in town because all buses go to town. We say no, because there is merit in a magistrate being in a district—getting to know the families, getting to know the troublemakers, getting to know the good ones, getting to know everybody—because context is everything.”

 

Calling for greater cross-country connectivity, Mottley backed a recommendation from a resident to expand existing routes to underserved rural communities.

 

“I really want to support the recommendation for us to work harder to be able to find it possible to facilitate cross-country movement in a better way than we have done before,” she said. “And if we felt that it was a little too complex for our brains alone to achieve, the artificial intelligence—the AI—now allows us to be able to plug in all of the metrics, all of the data, and to begin to give us better solutions.”

 

She urged Transport Board officials to extend at least one of two buses currently operating from Oistins and Six Roads to reach Society, St John. Such expansions, she argued, would better connect communities, particularly during national events like the We Gatherin’ parish celebrations.

 

Mottley said: “When St Philip We Gatherin’ comes around in July, the people from St John may want to go down to St Philip, you understand… especially since St Philip believe that Calypso begin and end there, and it’s Crop Over time.”

 

The prime minister also gave an update on the government’s bid transition from the state-owned Transport Board to a new Mass Transit Authority, which she described as a broader plan to shift the state’s role from operator to regulator while fulfilling an International Monetary Fund mandate to wean the government off state-owned enterprises.

 

“We are in the process of trying to transition to a Mass Transit Authority from the Transport Board, which will involve, once we have the discussions with the unions, enfranchisement and a whole host of other things,” she said. “But really letting government focus on regulation, and letting ordinary citizens be responsible for ownership of the buses and the operation of the buses.”

 

She indicated the government would be willing to assist with financing arrangements to support this model.

 

“Suffice it to say that these things, once they start to happen, will probably cause us to also step back and look at the dedicated school bus system.”

 

Mottley revealed that the state currently spends approximately $5 million per year in Transport Board fees for schoolchildren and floated the idea of going to tender for a dedicated school bus service.

 

“If we isolated that amount and go out to a [Request for Proposals] for persons to provide a school bus system for us—recognising that the island can be divided into quadrants—it may mean the transfer system to which you referred,” she said. “And the transfers ought to be looked at, in any event, as a regulated fee to add on to the thing, rather than making a person pay two fares outright coming and going.”

 

The prime minister also did not address common complaints of chaos, safety issues and traffic violations in the privately owned transit system or the failure of the Transport Authority to stem the tide of infractions that has brought complaints from industry leaders themselves.

(SZB)

 

 

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