News
From bus halts to ‘ambalamas’
The government in collaboration with the private sector has spent large sums of money to upgrade bus halts in the country. But whether the general public benefits from these upgrades is debatable.
A tour around Colombo city revealed many bus halts being used as ‘rest rooms’ by homeless city dwellers or occupied by vendors peddling their wares.
In a number of instances, bus halts had been disfigured by a variety of posters pasted over advertisements put up by private sector sponsors of the facility.
While programmes to upgrade the standards of the bus halts have been largely successful, the abuse of the facilities as places of rest and wayside boutiques is leading to members of the public avoiding the use of the facilities.
-
- Bus halt or ambalama?
-
- The ugly hoardings together with the not so lovely sight of a sleeping homeless city dweller does not encourage travellers to use this facility
-
- A vendor appears to have set up shop at this bus halt with chairs amid his garbage collection
-
- This filthy and damaged ‘upgraded’ bus halt effectively drives commuters away from the shelter
-
- Gloriously drunk and asleep!
While the government has allocated legitimate advertising space at each bus halt to ensure a limit on the number of adverts, unauthorised advertisers in the form politicians, private tuition classes and various publicity campaigns have illegally taken over entire bus halts.
Additionally, these unaesthetic hoardings do little to enhance the peace of mind of the public nor attract more foreign tourists to visit the country.
A commuter noted, “…improvements to the public transport system have definitely been made, but the general public must be able to reap the benefits of the improvements that have been implemented”.