10
are the adults, not students, throughout the summer
months, as shown by statistics. Students
normally travel earlier than 8 am to school.
virtually most of the congestion is
In
fact
caused by adults during peak hours, and the past
pattern has shown that the peak seasons are from
June to September, which is the peak of the peak in
and this is precisely where we must apply this
mechanism now to solve the overcrowding and safety
problem.
the year,
MR. SOHMEN: We are dealing here with human nature and
trying to break ingrained habits. In my opinion would it
not be better, instead of using the whip, to use the carrot,
and reduce the fares prior to 8 am?
The argument that the MTRC will be losing money does not
really wash if we are trying to get the passengers into
other modes of transport anyway so they are not really
that losing any money. I would suggest to use the incentive
of cheaper fares before 8 am
would have a more dramatic
effect than penalising the travellers after 8
am.
SECRETARY FOR TRANSPORT: Sir, the revenue forgone if the
corporation were to reduce non-peak fares would be almost
$2 billion because the large bulk
of
income would come
from the non-congestion period rather than the congestion