ACCIDENTS are continuing to haunt cash-strapped, state-owned bus entity the Jamaica Urban Transit Company, which has since January 1 recorded a total 852 smash-ups involving its buses, with four days left in the year.

In December alone, its Spanish Town-based depot recorded 12, the Portmore depot 23 and the Rockfort depot 34. Interestingly the Rockfort depot for the calendar year has recorded 350 accidents to date compared to 375 last year.

But according to corporate communications manager at the JUTC Reginald Allen, the overall figure this year is a far cry from the 1,600 accidents that JUTC buses were involved in between 2003/2004.

“I don’t have the exact figure, so I can’t deny or confirm that there were 852 accidents this year, but what I can say is that the JUTC accident stats have been coming down consistently over the last six years from over 1,600. Last year it was about 800,” Allen told the Observer in an interview.

“What you have to bear in mind is that what are called ‘accidents’ involve every single little thing. So 850 accidents doesn’t mean 850 times a bus is smashed up on the road. Every single time counts. If a side mirror touches, it’s an accident.

“It (852) is not out of the norm…but 850 is an amazing number coming from 1600 and as I indicated most of these are really very minimal.

“We are talking about huge buses, some of them the articulated types and they will touch something or something will touch them every now and then. Remember an accident is not just the JUTC bus touching something, it’s something touching the JUTC bus and once it connects, it’s an accident.

“When you consider this large figure you have to bear in mind how many of them are really major damage. If we had 850 major collisions we couldn’t have remained in business. Most of those are very minor things,” he said.

Allen, who said that he could not speak to the insurance costs of the accidents to the company nor the repairs costs, maintained that “the costs have been going down because the number of accidents have been going down over the last six years consistently.

“But it’s still a high cost that we would clearly like to minimise further,” he said, adding that several initiatives had been put in place to assist in this thrust.

“It’s still a major channel but we are on a positive path in terms of accident reduction,” he told the Observer.

Commenting on the figures which showed that the Spanish Town depot had much less accidents than other locations, Allen said:

“Spanish Town for a good while has been very impressive in comparison to the others in terms of reduction in accidents. It has been a leader even though it operates less buses than the other two depots. But even when you look at it on a per capita basis Spanish Town has been heading in the right direction in terms of accident reduction,” Allen said.

He said that the JUTC has continued to reward or recognise drivers who drive accident-free under its driver incentive programme as part of the thrust to reduce road accidents, in addition to regularly testing the vision of the entire bus crew and conducting random testing of bus crews for drug use, the penalty being job separation for those found guilty.

“Where indiscipline is concerned, there is a protocol, there are procedures. Persons have lost their jobs for irresponsibility. We don’t play around with responsibility because we convey human life. When you take a bus with 50- odd and over 80 people that’s an awesome responsibility and irresponsibility in that regard is not tolerated,” Allen said.

“We have had jobs terminated for gross irresponsibility or progressive irresponsibility. We have had many cases. We do not tolerate indiscipline in terms of operation of units,” he said.

“We have a very comprehensive driver training programme which not only focuses on how to control the unit but also on the driver’s ability to remain calm in the face of aggression and other situations.

“We find over time that a lot of times when we have had problems it’s just because of a bad exchange between a commuter and a driver, and the driver focusing on the commuter instead of the road, so we have been trying to minimise those,” Allen said.

In the meantime, Allen said that the number of accidents involving its units stand to decline further.

“We have roughly halved the number of accidents but we are really looking at going much further and with the new types of buses, we find that the yellow buses — unlike the older ones which can be driven much faster — are restricted in terms of the pace at which they can be driven.

“The new buses are governed. None of them can be driven over 70 kilometres per hour,” Allen said.

The high rate of accidents has beleaguered the cash-strapped entity since its formation in 1998 and has affected the efficiency, revenue-earning ability and revenue maximisation efforts of the company. The JUTC, which currently operates throughout the Kingston Metropolitan Transport Region, presently has over 800 drivers and a fleet of just over 300 buses.

Over the period from April 2004 to March 2005, JUTC buses were involved in less than 1,500 accidents, down from 1,623 in 2003/04. In 2000/01, JUTC buses were involved in 1,398 accidents. That figure declined to 1,375 the following year, but increased to 1,409 in 2002/03.