It has come to a point where I decided to spam the MPs and create a public page on Facebook.
I’m posting this here so hopefully people with similar issues will find it, post their issues and show the real extent of the problem.
http://www.facebook.com/SingaporeNoisyNeighbours
Please invite your friends, etc. and share the page out so it will have the intended audience/reach to have impact.
Dear Mr. Liang, Ms. Sim, et al.,
There has been some commotion after several cyclists were killed in road accidents, and after meeting with another reckless cyclists yesterday I feel I need to write to an authority about this before more people get hurt.
I am not sure which ministry (LTA? SPF?) to send this to, hence I am writing to you.
I recall that many years back there was an old man/lady being run over by a bicycle on pavement. Newspapers reported the incident and mentioned that bicycles are not allowed on pavements.
Over the years it has become common knowledge that bicycles are not allowed on pavements and people have started to cycle on the roads. I am starting to see more and more people take up cycling, but these cyclists are becoming more of a nuisance and road hog, posing not only inconvenience but danger to both themselves and road users.
I am a driver and cyclist myself and I usually cycle on pavements because I feel it is safer. I will give way to pedestrians when I meet them. Moreover my wife is not a very proficient cyclist, and I think that cycling on the road would be extremely dangerous.
I have heard from friends that they get fined $50 for cycling on pavements, which I think is ridiculous if they weren’t cycling recklessly. Enforcement should be against any reckless cyclist, be it on the road or pavement.
I’ve seen countless number of cyclists flout traffic rules, and here is one such incident causing an accident:
http://singaporeseen.stomp.com.sg/stomp/sgseen/this_urban_jungle/1279106/reckless_cyclist_runs_red_light.html
Another public video of a cyclist switching lanes recklessly at Jurong East and getting hit by a car (skip the first few seconds of the video):
Along Woodlands Road all the way to Bukit Timah which I travel daily, the road is already very bumpy, winding and narrow due to the Downtown Line MRT construction:
Also, buses are very wide and use an entire lanes width. Since cyclists keep left and the left lanes are now mostly bus lanes, buses have to make bigger evasive maneuvers to avoid cyclists.
I would like to suggest that we allow cyclists to cycle on pavements with the exception of electric bicycles which are much heavier and can go very fast (a lot of illegal ones are around nowadays).
The rationale for my suggestion is:
Sincerely,
Justin Lee
After some recent news about cyclists being run over by cars, people started saying things like cars pay for road tax, COE, ERP and hence cyclists need to stay off the road. Cyclists then start saying that their bikes don’t wear off the road. WTF?!
I think some people are just damn narrow minded. It’s not about road tax, ERP or COE. It’s about your own safety when cycling.
Law says you can ride on the road. It does not say you *must* ride on the road if you feel it’s not safe. There are park connectors. Hell screw it, even if there’s no park connectors I will *still* choose to ride on the pavement.
Same goes for nobody says you *can* walk on the road, but some people still choose to walk on the road.
And some cocks still choose to cycle 2 abreast on a busy or narrow road. I know the law says you *can*, doesn’t mean you *should*. This shows how selfish people can get. Bicycles are slow moving vehicles, and if you want to talk about rules of the road, then bikes should jolly well KEEP LEFT.
I am for cycling on pavements, illegal or not.. my safety is my top priority. If the roads are too busy to cycle on, I’ll get on the pavement. On pavements bicycles should give way to human pedestrians, that’s about all we need to do for a peaceful society. I don’t know which civil service idiot said we can’t cycle on pavements. They should shoot themselves. The number of fatalities of cyclists vs. cars is certainly higher than old aunties vs. bicycles.
Why not on the road? Because our roads are getting too crowded with bus lane and all. It poses even more danger to a cyclist AND other road users. The bicycle is slow and fragile. Riding alongside a road with bus or lorry going at twice its speed is so damn dangerous. People have to swerve to get away from crazy ass cyclists swinging left to right trying to pedal hard to keep up with road traffic speeds.
Secondly there are lots of traffic rules to abide to when using the roads. A lot of cyclist do not follow these rules. They cycle on the road, then turn onto pedestrian crossings when they meet a red light, or simply beat the light, or turn into filter lanes, or cycle across zebra crossings. Just a few examples of the many many crazy cyclists I’ve seen.
There’s no control over bicycles on the road. There’s no license plates to identify a person, there’s no (legislative) need to know road traffic rules to ride on the road, there’s no speed limit, no traffic camera — nothing, basically, to enforce that bicycles must adhere to traffic rules.
And if you start telling me because you have a road bike hence you need to cycle on the road, then I can tell you I have a Ferrari and I should race on the roads too.
It’s not always about the money. Your life is worth more than that.
I don’t understand why we still have MBT and TPL in Parliament. Screw the GRC system, each candidate should be opposed one-on-one. Singapore today is mature enough to not make race or religion a deciding factor.
Workers Party, please do us proud. I offer my 2 cents:
Abolish the CPF installment payments starting at 62 years of age – it does not benefit the poor at all. Not many of them live till that age. The statistics are flawed. Only the rich get to receive this money.
Please don’t raise the HDB income ceiling already – it will encourage more rich people to buy and further inflate the flat prices.
Instead, stagger the income ceiling based on the flat type, i.e. bigger flat bigger ceiling so the higher income group don’t contend with the lower income group with the 4-room flats causing it to rise much faster than the rest.
Lower the income ceiling for PRs – this will encourage the well-to-do PRs to either rent (good for Singaporeans) or buy private property at inflated and more violatile prices.
Impose more penalties on crappy public transport operators.
Stop the gerrymandering and grant us our rights to freedom of speech.
Lower the crazy ministerial salaries, tax the rich, provide healthcare for the poor.
Finally, curb the influx of foriengners that are not only taking away some low income worker’s jobs but also breaking up families.
Create quotas for different industry segments based on supply and demand.
I’m not saying all foreign talents should go – skilled white-collar workers that we can learn a trick or two from can stay. That’s what they are here for – they want a jumping board, trade up their knowledge for a few years. Fair and square.
OK, I’ve had enough of people blindly saying good things about the men in white and that the oppositions suck. We have to discount the opposition because they haven’t been on the job yet – how would I expect you to know how to fix my problems if I haven’t even hired you?
Yes, due respect for LKY. He’s a great man, but things have changed. This country is no longer 3rd world and cannot be managed like the way it was before.
I quote a note shared by a friend on Facebook:
I fear the Singaporean who says “I think the opposition candidate in my constituency is crap, but I will vote him anyway because I think the PAP is arrogant.” I cannot agree with that.
Cannot agree with what? Arrogance? Arrogance diminishes wisdom my friend.
No doubt there are really good and smart people amongst the men in white, such as GY, TCH, GCT but I’ve had enough of them especially the MP in my area (now contesting in Holland-Bukit Timah GRC). Let me relate my experience.
I have a neighbour noise problem. And trust me I’m not the only person in Singapore with this issue. Google it and you will find it. Some people have it worse than me and this affects people’s lives.
Yes, I’m a musician and I’m sensitive to noise, but I am not unreasonable. I’ve been living in HDB flats since young and haven’t heard such noises at my parent’s flat. Worse even, these noises occur at night right above my bedroom. I can’t sleep in peace or spend a weekend at home without going crazy. HDB flats nowadays are built cheaply with paper thin walls that I can hear every noise my neighbour makes. I’ve tried to talk to my neighbour, called the police, visited my MP and even written in to HDB.
What pisses me off is my MP being the last resort not giving a hoot about my neighbour problem. When I asked him if there’s any law governing these issues, he said “not really” and there’s nothing much he can do except write a letter to HDB. Yes, he did indeed write a letter to HDB, but I’ve never seen the HDB officer visit my flat to even listen to the kind of noises I have to put up with.
So what do I need my MP for when he doesn’t even bother? I’m not saying all of PAP is bad, but some shit needs to be fixed.
And I quote my friend again:
But I don’t think voting against someone good as a statement against the GRC system is entirely logical…
So if I vote for the same group, I will get the same guy who will not solve my problem anyway. How about let’s say have you ever done a project with a crappy team mate? Reality of life is that if you have a bad team mate, he/she drags you into the water. If I stand up for such a system, I’m supporting gerrymandering and the GRC bullshit.
I feel the severe lack of freedom of speech, the lack of the right to even request for something. I’m not taking about Mas Selamat, the floods and the overcrowded MRT and roads. These are civil service issues that are brought about by the policies that were (or not) made.
Get this fact right – the civil service will only act by the book and these laws are defined by our government. As of now there are no laws protecting us. Read the first few pages of the WP manifesto, it is quite interesting.
FYI, I had to take things into my own hands and it got really ugly to a stage that my property agent actually went up to my neighbour with some fruits to make peace. But the issue is still not totally resolved. Take it that I’m firing my MP and finding a new one.
Not many political discussions make it to my blog, but I think this one is worth blogging about since this actually sparked off a long discussion on Facebook.
Wife’s friend said the problem is not with how CPF works but with Singaporeans not knowing how to age gracefully. I totally agree with this.
There are many opinions on whether CPF is a good or bad system. Some say it is good because it forces Singaporeans to save and controls their spending during retirement, some say it’s bad because the lower income will have no CPF to start with and they are left to die, some conspiracy theories say we don’t really know if CPF even has enough money to pay out with our aging population.
Nevermind the speculation. Let me talk about retirement.
Retirement is a common misconception that most of us have; most people expect to work till the so-called retirement age and then all of a sudden they retire and stop working. This is the very reason why some of you have your old folks telling you things like “(they) have fed you for the past 20 years, it’s time for you to pay back.”
I’m not against filial piety, but expecting your child to feed you through your retirement isn’t the right mentality either. A lot of people I’ve seen suffer precisely because of their warped idea of this ancient Chinese virtue – their parents decided that it’s time to retire because their children are now working and that they should be given a (hefty) monthly allowance so they can go and play mahjong, visit the casino, buy alcohol and smoke weed when their children have just barely started with their career and are still paying off their study loans. Is this right?
People say that they worry for their future generations – that they will not be able to afford a flat, keep up with the education system and adapt to the rising costs of living in Singapore. If we continue to have such a mentality living dollar-to-dollar, spending all our money saying that we live only once, and hoping our children will one day make tonnes of money and turn you into a full-time Tai Tai, how are we helping our children ourselves by doing this to them, let alone allow our government to help us?
I empathize with the people who are not poor by choice but poor by circumstance, but I have seen too many people poor by choice, i.e. they don’t know how to save, spend all their earnings, refuse to work, or just gamble their money away. These are the very people who just blatantly pick any topic and blame the government for their current poor state.
Get this right guys – no government can solve this problem. If for example Singapore ceases the CPF system and start feeding and caring for these people who are “poor by choice” then the tax payers will have to bear the high taxes – typically in excess of 30% as seen by most developed nations with such schemes. Or if for example we have a minimum wage scheme, people will become unemployed as they are priced out of their value (thanks Prof Ben – insightful discussion).
If you have worked hard for your money and you pay 30% tax just to feed these people, will you be angry?
By then you think we’ll still find $3 chicken rice or $0.90 coffee in Singapore when wages and taxes are so high?
For the middle sandwich class, every one of us should fend for ourselves and plan our so-called retirement which does not necessarily mean to stop working and play mahjong all day long but to continue doing something we love/enjoy as we age and hopefully (and very likely) make decent money during the process.
For the lower income group – I’m talking about those who can’t even afford to read this article folks. If you have fucking Internet access, you are not POOR – I believe the government is there to help. Go and seek aid.
The retirement concept is dead folks. Don’t rely on your CPF.
FYI – just in case you are wondering, I am pretty party neutral. I don’t like the high minister pay, neither am I a Kate Spade fan. I’m not exactly pleased with the increase in CPF contribution rates either since I think it does little for our so-called retirement. I also do think a fair amount of minority party making some noise would help keep the majority ruling party on their feet. Overall, Singapore is still a very safe country and I appreciate that.