NTCS buses get reprieve
AN 11th hour arrangement hammered out yesterday will spare buses operated under the umbrella of Ezroy Millwood’s National Transport Co-operative Society being dragged off routes in Kingston, but the NTCS has protection only until Tuesday when it is to sign a formal sub-licence agreement with the government’s Jamaica Urban Transit Company.
Millwood’s organisation has for months refused to sign what the JUTC had insisted was its final contract, but the issue came to a head this week when the Transport Authority, the regulatory body, disclosed that it would, from today, start taking off the city’s streets NTCS buses not properly authorised to operate in the greater Kingston area.
But apparently a compromise was brokered yesterday at a hastily-mustered meeting between the NTCS, the JUTC and transport ministry officials, although the specifics of the agreement were not disclosed.
“They (NTCS) have been issued a sub-licence for between now and Tuesday when the permanent one will be signed,” the Transport Authority’s managing director, Joan Fletcher, said yesterday.
More than two years ago, the JUTC took over those of the city’s bus franchises that used to be operated by NTCS – having paid $337.7 million to buy-out that last five years of the contract .
The JUTC, in turn, agreed to provide a sub-licence to the Millwood-led organisation to operate so-called executive service buses on some routes, as well as to run in hilly, suburban areas.
But for months the NTCS has declined to sign the agreement, with Millwood claiming that the delay was because of complex terms and agreements being negotiated.
Flush from a recent $12.5-billion award to the NTCS because of the government’s failure to hike bus fares in the early 1990s, Millwood this week threatened a fierce legal battle if the Transport Authority went through with its decision to remove the co-op’s buses.
But it was not clear last night who had blinked – Millwood or the JUTC – at a lengthy meeting between all the players.
Millwood, who had been insisting on changes in the JUTC contract, was not available for comment last night and a JUTC official would only say that there was agreement on the issues that were raised by the NTCS.
“The issues he put on the table, included outstanding fees owed by the NTCS and the establishing of pre-defined bus stops, were finally agreed upon,” said the JUTC’s service planning manager, Jacqueline Darwood.
She said the Transport Authority had made it clear that the bus stops could not be established without a sub-licence.
With the NTCS buses free of the removal threat, the Transport Authority’s Fletcher said her organisation would instead be focussing on other buses operating illegally in the Kingston Metropolitan Transport Region (KMTR).
“We are going to seize all buses operating illegally in the KMTR but we won’t be touching the NTCS (today),” Fletcher said. “All I am saying is that they (NTCS) must have a licence to be on the road.”
