Not too far away from our office, it seems like our public transport had a small hiccup.
Instead of our MRT trains breaking down, a bus had a skirmish with some infrastructure (yes a bollard, you read it in the title).
Thankfully, this was a no-casualty accident, which is probably the best kind of accident if we absolutely had to choose.
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What Happened
On 13 May 2019, Monday, a woman calling herself JL online was at The Clementi Mall, near the interchange, in the evening. At 7.15pm, she was interrupted by a loud noise and apparently tremors from the clash.
In her words: “There was a loud thump and I felt a vibration on the ground.”
An SBS Transit bus, service 156, rammed into a bollard, and suffered for it as seen from its busted front bumper.
Yes, it’s from Stomp. JL saw a (fortunately minor) accident and embodied what our citizens are known to do: snap a picture and Stomp. This is the rise of citizen journalism.
So Let’s Talk About Bollards
We’re doing it because that’s what the netizens are fixated on and because I have a word count to hit.
What is the function of a bollard? According to Wikipedia, they’re used “to control road traffic and posts designed to prevent ram raiding and car ramming attacks”.
More close to home, the structures were put all over bus stops from 1999 onwards by the Land Transport Authority (LTA), after three fatalities and four serious casualties resulted from a sports car ploughing into a Bendemeer Road bus stop.
Said LTA: “bollards prevent speeding vehicles from ploughing further into bus stops, and reduce the risk of a direct impact on commuters at the bus stop.”
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The benefits most likely transfer to bus bays as well.
This policy may have directly prevented casualties this fateful evening. By not collapsing, the ones in Clementi certainly did their job.
And people noticed
Some were smart asses.
Others showed that they got their priorities right.
So next time you’re waiting for the bus, take a moment to appreciate the stout structures between you and the road. They were a conscious decision to preserve our lives.
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But don’t take them for granted.
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