THE State-owned Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC) says it is recording an average 80 to 90 accidents per month. The accidents are costing the company millions of dollars to repair buses, repay massive insurance claims and to compensate victims.
JUTC Managing Director Colin Campbell says the accidents are one too many. He said though they were of varying levels of seriousness, in some cases they “resulted in loss of life, damage to buses, down time of the units, massive insurance and personal injury claims.”
He said for example, in minor incidents, the company has lost an average of 20 windscreens in accidents per month.
It cost a total $500,000 to replace one windscreen.
Campbell said the statistics were unacceptable.
“We have too many accidents and too many accidents that could be avoided,” he said. “We just really have to make sure that we put in as much effort as we can to reduce the accidents.”
As such, company officials have embarked on an aggressive retraining exercise for drivers.
“It is a programme we do every two years,” said Campbell, explaining that during the exercise drivers are lectured on safety and reminded of the implications the accidents have on the operations of the company.
The company, he said, was also aggressively moving to achieve the international benchmark of one accident for every 50, 000 kilometres.
He said that when he went to the JUTC it was recording one accident for every 26,000 kilometres. Programmes have been put in place to reduce those numbers, he explained.
Last Monday a vendor was crushed to death and five other persons injured after a JUTC bus ran off the road and slammed into the side of a store along West Parade, downtown Kingston.
The driver had to be cut from the vehicle.
Three days after that incident another bus belonging to the company ran off the road and into a gully in the Barbican Road area of St Andrew.
Reports are that the bus driver was picking up staff in the area when the incident happened around 4:30 am.
The bus that ran off the road and into a gully in Barbican, St Andrew last week. (File Photo)
These bums need retraining every 90 days! A point system should be in place as an incentive fi tap destroy de damn bus dem! For instance, a point system for every accident/incident a driver has, when they have reached the max then termination is in order.
Why is it you didn’t say that the buses need servicing? Most of those buses, that I take everyday, are accidents waiting to happen. The simple task of cleaning the buses is not done. The buses are filled with mold, the A/c vents are dirty, the drivers cannot put on seat belts because they are dirty, the seats for passengers are dirty. I took one this morning and it sounded as if it was about to shut off. The driver had to be revving the bus every time he stopped.
The management of the company needs to take some or partial responsibility for these mishaps. Get qualified persons to service the buses and get the right parts and stop being cheap and putting peoples lives in danger. I have stood many a morning and seen buses passing and going back into the depo for “repairs” for the driver to get a “new” unit.
Yu want me fi overlook operator error? I don’t deal inna lies and I’m a Public Administrator so me know exactly what JUTC doing wrong.
You just add to it by stating:
“the drivers cannot put on seat belts because they are dirty”
That is a CARELESS driver!
“The driver had to be revving the bus every time he stopped.”
Driver and JUTC CARELESSNESS because the last driver to drive that bus and park it last night knew it had a problem and should have logged it in for maintenance.
I graduated from hot wiring car, shut dung alarm systems back in the days when de boys use to carry “strange” cars on the block, using foil papa fi keep fuse going, me jack up car and change me own tire, buy me own jumpa cables and can go up unda me car and change me oil n filter if I had to, so me know say a no management a mash up the vehicles. Management too LAX and mek the driver dem do as dem please.
The drivers are at fault any way yu tek it. You should know that many of JUTC mechanics are well trained. Couple I know come America and a Lexus, Mercedes and dem place de dem qualify fi work inna.
The buses are not being serviced and they should talk about that instead of blaming the drivers.
So a lack a maintenance cause the bus dem fi crash inna people car all when brakes a work?
A lack a maintenance cause the bus dem fi sail pass yu like bat-out-a hell a road?
A lack a maintenance cause a driver with medical problems fi pass out and crash causing a fatality?
A lack a maintenance side swipe people car pon de road?
Maintenance goes towards the functionality of the vehicles, but the “90 accidents monthly for jutc” nah nothing fi do wid maintenance.
So you are saying the drivers have no regard for their own lives?Why would you drive a bus that could kill you and others? They should put undercover supervisors on these buses to observe and report and then fire the reckless drivers.
Bring back jolly bus. Look how jolly bus did big, all double decker buses were in JA and no big accidents. Jolly bus, mawkit trucks, cane trucks a trod di likkle country roads dem from when and deze breed a accidents neva did a happen. No iyah, dem driva yah want to get some retraining or wi haffi guh call up all di old retire drivers fi come back pon di roads. Eeda is di drivas or dere is some hugge mechanical flaw in deze buses, which is not impossible.
Blame the drivers yes. Dem drive like dem deh a Dover. Jungle justice a guh gawn if dem keep on a kill people. Why dem affii drive so fast? And I’m sure juts offices get calls every 10 mins about dem drive but nothing is being done.
Not surprised about the number of accidents. If u check d facts most times a d bus dem a run into ppl not the other way around.