Do you know that the MTR (Mass Transit Railway) in Hong Kong is one
of the most profitable metro systems in the world?
The first MTR line was opened in 1979 with the aim to solve traffic
congestion problems brought by the economic growth of Hong Kong. The service of
MTR started to get popular as it really helps commuting inside Hong Kong, so
its network has expanded a lot over these years. There could be over 5 million
MTR trips in an average weekday while the service can still achieve a 99.9%
on-time rate. Such efficiency surely shocks the rest of the world (or so I
heard).
After it merged with the KCRC (Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation)
in 2007, MTR company takes up almost half of the market share of the franchised
public transport market, becoming the oligopoly (if not a monopoly) of the Hong
Kong public transport sector.
Since the introduction of the fare adjustment mechanism in 2009, the
company promised to provide a fair and transparent way to control the ticket’s
price. Basically they will adjust the price by judging the CPI and the nominal
wage rate, in other words, “fare increases when there is inflation”.
The problem is Hong Kong has been experiencing inflation and the
fares have been increasing for
seven years, accumulating a total of 25% increase in the price! This, of
course, makes the public angry. Yes, you can argue with the free economy theory
and defend how a corporation has the right to maximize profit. However, there’s
no way it is a “fair and transparent way to control the ticket price” when they don’t even take their
performance and profit level into account. They are making over HK$10 billion a
year and there are more delay and signal failure. Reasons like “to protect
shareholders’ interests” and “to improve qualities of the services” aren’t
going to cut it. And don’t get me start on those insulting fare concession /
refund plans…3% discount? 10% off for the second trip on the same day? What do
we look like? Beggars?
I
guess I should just go to my workplace on foot.
It
only takes, like, 6 hours or so…
Too
bad there are only 24 hours a day.
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