Vaz tours HWT Transport Centre, observes changes following fare reduction implementation
KINGSTON, Jamaica – Daryl Vaz, Minister of Science, Energy, Telecommunications, and Transport, visited the Half-Way Tree Transport Centre on Monday to observe operations since the implementation of reduced fares.
The start of the new calendar year marked a decrease in bus fares at the Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC).
On November 21, the Jamaican Government announced a reduction in the JUTC fare from $100 to $70; a decrease in the fare for children from $30 to $25; and for pensioners from $40 to $30, which took effect on January 1, 2024. Further reductions are scheduled for April 1, 2024, with the regular fare dropping from $70 to $50. Fares for children will be further reduced from $25 to $20, and pensioners’ rates from $30 to $25.
The reductions are part of measures to curtail the impact of the increase in public passenger vehicle (PPV) fares on the overall inflation rate.
Accompanied by Managing Director of the JUTC, Paul Abrahams, Chairman of the Transport Authority, Owen Ellington, Managing Director of the Transport Authority, Ralston Smith, and other officials from the JUTC, as well as the Ministry of Science, Energy, Telecommunications, and Transport, Minister Vaz said he wanted to “see what the situation was at the transport centre and actually travel on a bus to see exactly what the experience is.”
According to a release on Monday, the Minister highlighted that he saw several challenges that urgently needed to be addressed, including the availability of buses and the long wait time of commuters.
Citing that the route on which he travelled could take up to one and a half hours one way, Vaz said he recognised that commuters were at a major disadvantage.
“It makes no sense blaming anybody. The responsibility is mine and the team that I am gathered here with, and therefore I have to take it and deal with it,” the Minister stated, reiterating his commitment to getting 100 of the 300 buses procured so far on the roads as soon as June.
“I asked the commuters today on the bus that I travelled (on) to give me 6 months… the bottom line is I understand the urgency; I hear and feel the frustration of the old, the young, the female, mother, grandmother, everybody that was on that bus today… and as I said before, I understand,” he said.
“Today was an eye-opener for me – the half an hour that I spent in the bus, I experienced what I needed to experience, and that is going to give me even more of the commitment and the urgency to make changes and to get the buses that are required here so that people can travel in an efficient, comfortable, safe environment. That is the least that a government and a country can do for its taxpayers.”
