PTSC 'buss' in S/Grande

THE EDITOR: I am a paying customer from Sangre Grande who for the past few years, have used the PTSC bus for my commute to and from my home to Port of Spain on a daily basis. Back then, the service, even though it was not always reliable, you were almost certain to get a bus.

However, over a year ago, the service has deteriorated to a position where you get a bus to Port of Spain but none to return home in Sangre Grande. This none availability of the bus service is due to most of the buses that run the Sangre Grande route not being road worthy.

On many occasions, the bus left Sangre Grande or Port of Spain and never reached its destination due to the bus shutting down and most times, a replacement bus is impossible since there are no other available and dependence on obtaining another from another depot is impossible since they don’t accommodate the Sangre Grande passengers for whatever reasons.

We the passengers heard through the “grapevine” last year that new buses were expected and that Sangre Grande was to be allotted eight, even though that number it is not adequate to service all routes in the east such as Sangre Grande, Rio Claro, Toco and Guayaguayare.

To date, the service has not improved. I and many others have come to the conclusion that PTSC management does not have a say on how things are done since it seems the drivers want all the new buses for Port of Spain only and that is final.

For far too long there have been a lot of issues pertaining to public transportation and this service is getting inferior. A lot of public servants use the bus to commute on a daily basis, due to the price of private transportation being too high. The bus is a means of safe and cheap transportation.

For the past few months, absolutely no bus has been made available since they are not road-worthy and has not been issued a certificate and as such all passengers who normally commute on the bus have been forced to use other means of transportation which takes a toll on their pockets.

I am pleading with the general manager of the Public Transport Service Corporation to send the eight new buses to service the PoS to Sangre Grande route. Port of Spain is not the only part of Trinidad. Sangre Grande is too.

VERONICA MARSHALL

Sangre Grande

EDITOR'S NOTE: A PTSC release sent to us indicated that eight buses are to be handed over to the Sangre Grande depot on Thursday.