With the recent push towards improving Penang, I would like to suggest to the state municipal council that they first improve the public transport system of the island. Public transport is desperately needed in the eastern and southern part of the island.

Due to the many job opportunities created by foreign companies in Bayan Lepas, Penang has attracted many workers from other states. This has created a huge increase in resident population which in turn strains the already existing but inefficient public transport system.

In addition to being stuffy, public buses never seem to arrive on time. Arriving at one's destination may mean anything from being 15 minutes to an hour late. This causes people to avoid using buses and they instead buy cars of their own compounding the already strained traffic conditions.

Ironically, these terrible traffic conditions lead to the public bus service being even more unreliable.

Another point worth noting is that in areas where there is traffic congestion, the council just removes the pedestrian walkways and widens the roads to allow more traffic. This is a hopeless solution.

Pedestrian walkways are crucial to realising the full potential of public transportation. When people who take buses arrive at the bus stop closest to their destination, they need to walk to reach the intended place.

By removing pedestrian walkways, the council is further discouraging people form using public transports. Rather than removing them, I would suggest the building of even more pedestrian walkways in the city centre as well as Bayan Baru Free Trade Zone.

Finding the money to improve Penang's public transport system might seem difficult. However, many existing projects in the state waste a huge amount of money.

Among these are the fibreglass seagulls structures along the coastal highway, the half-hearted 'beautification projects' that involve planting flowers in the middle of roads (they often die a few weeks later due to neglect), the soon-to-be-heavily-tolled Penang Outer Ring Road project.

All these 'investments' are unnecessary and the money could have been used to upgrade the state's public transport system.

Fancy projects like a subway system or a monorail system are useless at this stage of Penang's development. They only allow for more public funds to be siphoned into the pockets of multi-layered contractors.

What Penang needs is a reliable and efficient public bus service. This will solve her traffic woes. Period.