The Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC) has dismissed alarm bells raised by Opposition spokesman on transport Mikael Phillips that commuters will be met with severe chaos at the start of the new school year.

The State-owned and operated bus company said, having met its obligations for the resumption of schools countless times over the years, this occasion is no different.

“We are in back-to-school mode right now and our preparations are ongoing. I know what we are doing, and what we will be doing on the morning of back to school… We know what we are doing at JUTC. We’ve done back-to-school umpteen times. I’ll let the morning of back-to-school speak for itself,” managing director of the company Paul Abrahams told the Jamaica Observer on Tuesday.

On Monday, Phillips had issued a news release warning of a pending crisis in bus service in just under two weeks.

He pointed to a rapid decline in the service over the summer holidays, with just over 100 units being rolled out per day instead of the 260 he said are usually required during the summer.

Phillips said the effective transit demand in the Kingston Metropolitan Transport Region (KMTR) for the school terms is in excess of 450 buses. He argued that when students return to classes the JUTC “will not cope, leading to long delays and late school arrivals. This is a clear and imminent danger; we are heading into a period of mayhem in the transport system”.

He also said, if the situation is not rectified this week there will be a chaotic start to the academic year.

However, Abrahams said that, while he could not provide the exact number of buses slated for roll-out in September, the fleet would include several rehabilitated units. He also advised that the JUTC will be adding buses to a number of routes, but those logistics are still being ironed out at this point.

“Right now operations are looking at rationalising routes. It is a fact that we don’t have all the resources, so we use the resources as best as we can,” he stated.

Dr Shauna-Gaye Brown, general manager for Montego Bay Metro, which provides school bus service on the western side of the island, said all systems are in place to roll out the service for the new school year.

“Montego Bay Metro is basically ready. We have no choice but to be ready for the new school year. We know that the parents and the children are relying on us as one of the most considered safest means of transportation, so it’s expected that we will meet our obligation. We will be there for the people,” Dr Brown told the Observer.

She said customer service training has also been ramped up for staff to ensure that students are provided with the best service.

The company operates seven buses in St James and Trelawny, covering the communities of Sandy Bay, Goodwill, Falmouth, Mackfield, and Cambridge Road.

Meanwhile, the two main transport operator groups have opposing views on what commuters will face in September.

Head of the Transport Operators Development Sustainable Services (TODSS) Egeton Newman said the issue facing the public transportation sector is rationalisation of seats, not number of seats.

“There will be no chaos. There are just under 40,000 public passenger vehicles in Jamaica, about 13,000 operating in the KMTR, and when you multiply the 40,000, an average of seven seats, you get just over 320,000 seats, which is well in line with the amount of persons proposing to travel using public passenger vehicles, and that doesn’t include the JUTC,” he said.

Newman argued that there are too many buses on some routes; on other routes private operators are a law unto themselves, running routes although they are not JUTC sub-franchisees; and others where there are either no JUTC buses or not enough of them.

“We have enough seats, but they’re not being managed. What they need to do is regulate the taxis, throw down the gauntlet to them, and make changes to the regulations to allow them to operate on certain routes. They want to be regulated because they’re running illegally now, even though they have red plates,” he told the Observer on Tuesday.

He pointed to several routes in the Corporate Area which are serviced by operators who are not a part of the JUTC’s sub-franchising regime, arguing that it is time to regulate these routes and provide the operators with training and certification and allow them to provide the service legally.

“When you see them running, they’re not running from passengers, they’re running from the police. So change the regulation and allow them to run those routes,” he said.

He also said the Government needs to come to the rescue of the small operators who are unable to access loans to retrofit their vehicles as required. He said the finance ministry needs to encourage the commercial banks to buy into supporting the public transportation sector.

“The JUTC cannot manage a large fleet; they mash down every day, [but] we can do it,” Newman said.

At the same time, president of the Jamaica Association of Transport Owners and Operators Louis Barton agreed with Phillips that the sector isn’t looking good for September.

“The private operators, especially in the KMTR, they’re not organised to carry people in an organised way. The real solution to the problem is to have a real effective JUTC where you can count on JUTC having 400 buses rolling out every morning, but now I’m hearing that we have 220 buses per day and a certain amount of buses have to return before the end of the day because of breakdown and all of that,” he said.

He lamented that in the current situation, the JUTC is not playing the leading role that it should, and it is the private operators who are dominating the public transport system, which is in a state of disarray.

Barton said a part of the solution is to require operators to become members of private operators’ associations so that arrangements can be made through these groups for proper scheduling on the various routes.