Shortest entry ever? Anyway, here’s a quick one so that everyone will know. If you are driving through the gantry after Dairy Farm Road on the BKE towards PIE, then you’d have to start digging deeper into your pockets… because you’d have to start paying $0.50 more if you travel through the gantry from 7:30am-8:00am. The strangest thing about the report was that "the LTA did not say why it is raising the 7:30am-8:00am slot for the lone BKE gantry, but ERP rates are usually raised when average traffic speeds fall below the optimal 45kmh to 60kmh range for expressways".

In addition, it was reported that "a new interpretation of ‘optimal speed’ will take effect" and "instead of taking average speeds as a criterion for ERP rate changes, a more stringent method that ensures than 85 per cent of road users experience the optimal speed range will be applied". It was concluded that "in effect, the two new meaures mean the likelihood of more aggressive rate increases".

I am beginning if LTA is trying to hasten the process of ROI. Either that, or they are trying to show that ERP really works - by raising the ERP charges so high that drivers will have no choice but not to drive.

IT will cost motorists $1.50 to use the Bukit Timah Expressway (BKE) between 7.30am and 8am on weekdays from next Monday - up from $1 now.

The electronic road-pricing (ERP) gantry on the BKE between Dairy Farm Road and the Pan-Island Expressway is the only one being tweaked by the Land Transport Authority in its latest review of ERP rates.

The rates at all other gantries remain unchanged - until the next review in late-May, just before the June school holidays.

ERP rates are reviewed once every quarter as welll as just before school holidays. Prices are usually lowered for the latter.

The LTA did not say why it is raising the 7.30am-8am slot for the lone BKE gantry, but ERP rates are usually raised when average traffic speeds fall below the optimal 45kmh to 60kmh range for expressways.

The idea is to spread out demand so as to avoid congestion and achieve better traffic flow overall.

The fact that rates at all other gantries remain unchanged indicate that traffic flow at all ERP-controlled roads has not improved or deteriorated significantly in the last three months.

Miniscule adjustments, however, will be a thing of the past from July, when a new set of criteria for rate movements kick in.

As part of a slew of measures to control congestion and persuade more people to take public transport, ERP increments will be at least $1 each time - double the 50-cent jumps now.

That’s not all. A new interpretation of ‘optimal speed’ will take effect. Instead of taking average speeds as a criterion for ERP rate changes, a more stringent method that ensures than 85 per cent of road users experience the optimal speed range will be applied.

In effect, the two new meaures mean the likelihood of more aggressive rate increases.

They will apply in the CBD and Orchard area from July; and at most other ERP-controlled roads from November.

The remaining handful of outlying gantries will be affected from February next year.

Article obtained from straitstimes.com on 29th April 2008 dated 28th April 2008

Yes, I find myself yet again, in another unique position of having both the Starhub MaxMobile service as well as the M1 Broadband service running from the same computer. Not at the same time of course, since the active connection can only come from either source. However, because my laptop has an internal SIM card slot and I have the M1 Broadband dongle as well, I save the trouble of having to replace SIM cards when I want to test either connection.

Prior to connecting my Starhub MaxMobile for the first time, I experience bad connection problems with my M1 Broadband. Not only was the connection slow, but the graphics seemed distorted as well. Initially, I thought I needed a new driver for the display, but in an unusual twist of events, I realised that it was a graphic degradation due to slow downstream speed. Of course, it’s easy to push the blame to M1.

To me, 99.98% coverage means nothing to me if I am having problems getting a connection. To me, it was 0% coverage. Probability doesn’t work here. It’s not as if I am getting 99.98% uptime from my 0% coverage location. Don’t you just hate statistics?

So, here’s the golden question. Which is the better choice? To some people, it might be even a platinum question, but I digress.

One of the better ways to compare is to do a speed test - upload/download and ping from a particular site. On 29th April 2008 at 19:17, this test was done - but it seemed like a particularly bad day for testing because all the speeds were down - way down from being optimal. Perhaps it’s the feng shui.

Date: 29th April 2008

Time: From 19:17

*The upload for Wireless@SG was not successfully completed on multiple tries.

There’s a caveat to this test though. The M1 Broadband is subscribed under the lowest band, which is up to 1.8 Mpbs while Starhub’s MaxMobile is under the 7.2 Mbps plan - since they only have a single plan. For a rare moment, Wireless@SG outperformed both mobile broadband services. Of course, I didn’t mention about frequent dropping of connections.

However, it is also known that different areas have difference coverage. For me, the place where I spend 10 hours a day at has 0% coverage from M1 Broadband, and barely GPRS speed at home; while Starhub MaxMobile provided better coverage in the day and night for me. For me, it’s quite a clear cut choice.

One thing’s for sure. Ever since M1 went unlimited with their M1 Broadband, it was all down the drain.

It’s either it’s been such a hush-hush… or people just don’t seem to bother anyway. After all, the raise in fuel prices is beyond any consumer’s control. For all we know, it might jolly well cost a few dollars more the next day!

Indeed, it’s beginning to be so expensive to drive a car nowadays it’s better to… take public transport? Hey, but public transport cost will soon rise and basically there’s no running away. However, if you think it stops there, then you may be in for a surprise. Fuel price hike affects all industries that indirectly makes use of fuel. So, as long as the goods or services that you are receiving is "mobile" in some sense, you will be affected by the fuel price hike.

What a gloomy day.

Pump prices up across all brands

Three other oil companies have jumped on the bandwagon, after Caltex’s move

By Christopher Tan

THE OTHER oil companies have all followed Caltex’s move to raise pump prices here. ExxonMobil, Singapore Petroleum Co and Shell on Wednesday upped petrol prices by three cents a litre and diesel by five cents.

Their increases, within hours of each other, came a day after Caltex revised prices upwards. With the changes, a litre of 92, 95 and 98-octane petrol is $2.083, $2.116 and $2.190 before discount, while diesel is $1.663. Shell’s V-Power is $2.309, while Caltex’s Platinum is $2.316.

The latest pump price adjustment is the 10th consecutive increase since July last year - 11th if the GST-triggered increase on July 1, 2007 were to be included. Singapore’s goods & services tax was raised from 5 to 7 per cent last July.

The relentless increase in pump prices is just one of several price spirals Singapore residents are facing. The country’s inflation rate, at 6.7 per cent in March, is at the highest level in almost three decades. Some analysts are predicting it would reach 7 per cent this year, fuelled by high food and oil prices.

Likewise, crude oil prices are trading at record levels. In New York trading on Tuesday, oil hit US$119.90 (S$160) as the American currency weakened against the euro. This prompted investors to pick up more commodities - including oil - as an inflation hedge.

Some observers have questioned why pump prices here are not softening on the back of the strengthening Singapore dollar. The local currency is trading at an all-time high of $1.35 per US dollar.

Meanwhile, the escalation in fuel prices is costing motorists dearly. Drivers will now incur nearly $1,000 more in fuel a year than in January 2007, when a litre of petrol was $1.50. Station discounts, at 19 per cent back then, have dwindled to 5 per cent.

Article obtained from straitstimes.com on 29th April 2008 dated 23rd April 2008

Got this error this morning while loading straitstimes.com - is it another overloading of the website? Or has it got anything to do with my browser?

The perils of using Internet nowadays - I don’t know if there’s a problem with the site or if my computer has been infected with another unidentified virus/trojan/horsey/whatever.