Metro Mass To Introduce Bus-tracking System

Metro Mass Transit (MMT) is to introduce a bus-tracking system to ensure that its fleet of buses stays only on designated destinations. The move, apart from ensuring that its buses are not diverted, will provide security for workers and passengers. �Now ill�intentioned crew of the MMT are surely to be arrested so that money put into private pockets will be raked into company coffers,� Mr Eric Boadi-Misah, the Head of Communications of the company, said. This is part of MMT�s five-year Strategic Plan to be launched this year. The plan for 2014-2018 is aimed at achieving a world�class status with 1,500 buses and coaches in 2018. The focus is also to improve passenger and staff safety, customer service, expand access to services and ensure workplace comfortability. Currently, the company operates more than 800 buses daily from its fleet of 1,048, covering a distance of 43 million kilometres, and has moved more than 37 million passengers since 2010. Other innovations being introduced by the company include electronic ticketing and daily, weekly and monthly bus passes to tourist sites. On the drawing board, MMT is to acquire an additional 1,000 buses to augment the company�s current fleet, 600 of which would be procured with internally generated funds (IGF), while the 400 will be supplied by the Government (the company�s largest shareholder). New system According to the MMT�s Deputy Managing Director, Ing John Awuku Dzuazah, a tap-to-pay mechanism for ticketing will allow passengers to acquire electronic cards from the company. It will be loaded with the amount that the passengers can afford during a particular period determined by the company. �The same would go on for the installation of a fuel-management system where the fuel tank of the bus is integrated with the dispenser at the fuel station to ensure that only buses belonging to MMT are allowed to fuel,� he added. Passengers soar Over the last 10 years, the total number of passengers carried by MMT buses has steadily peaked from barely 397,000 in 2003 to over 367,888,236 as at the end of October 2013. "It is a social mandate which MMT carries for the people, and not a competitive market where other colleague operators would want to outdo MMT. The mission of MMT, incidentally, is to provide reliable, safe and efficient mass transport services by road in the sub-region,�Mr Boadi-Misah said.