Last night we showed you the angry city bus drivers complaining after their busses had been pulled off the city streets. They say they provide an essential service – which was particularly missed on the first day of school. The mayor on the other hand says that Belize Transit Services which runs the busses had been warned since 2009 to use smaller busses.
But today, members of the public started calling in to the talk shows saying how they needed the big busses, especially on Faber's Road.
That set the stage for a meeting this morning with the bus operator and the city's traffic manager. Phillip Jones of Belize Transit Services told us how it went and what he hopes will come out of it:…
Phillip Jones - General Manager, Belize Transit Services Ltd.
"Well I had the meeting this morning with the traffic manager and the councilor for traffic and basically what I did was try to have an extension for the ceasure of the busses in the city. I showed them the need for the bus at the moment, I stressed that I'm willing to work with the council and we know the city is growing and there will be times that we need to downsize but I just asked for a little grace period or an extension for a compromise to have the city flowing and for the workers to have something to do and for the commuters to not be affected at the same time. I personally believe that the meeting went very well, both the councilor and the traffic manager were very professional, they listened to my concern and they had assured me that they would discuss it further and I assumed it was with the other councilors and they would get back to me. As of now, I have not received any calls as yet or anything official, stating that I will be granted an extension or anything as such but I am positive - I think the council have professional people there and we need to have these services provided to the commuters and mainly the poorer class of commuters who are daily in need of the service and we are not shying away knowing that the city has to go and we don't want to keep back progress in the city but at the same time, I am just asking the council and councilors to just give me the extension. I am optimistic that they will do so, I humbly believe that way - I am hoping that I get something in writing before the end of the day or that they will call and re-instate our runs and provide the service and that we have been granted some sort of extension."
Monica Bodden
"What can commuters expect tomorrow? Will they get the big busses?"
Phillip Jones
"So far, we were allowed to run until 8;30am which is to mainly deal with workers and students - this afternoon I received a call that I could have continued to run but however, it has not been confirmed or finalized that I've been granted the extension to provide normal service until such a time - but until now nothing has finalized as yet or to say that there will be an extension granted that I had requested this morning in the meeting."
Jones stressed that nothing has been confirmed so far, and he awaits the outcome of further meetings.
Email
Print