Your article Coming up - easier ride for Penang commuters is, sad to say, an unusually shoddy piece of journalism. All the content - which may sound superficially reassuring to Penang's commuters - is attributed to some vague, unnamed 'government officials'.

This is not a problem if it happens to coincide with the reality on the ground but unfortunately from my monitoring of Penang's transport services, it is doubtful that Penang's public transport system can be anywhere near promising in the near future.

Penang's promise that public transport improvement will come around is questionable since little by way of any specific planning is available. The broad conceptual outline of the monorail's park-and-ride and free shuttle buses etc. are not new - the monorail was promised three general elections ago by the Gerakan-led state government.

The lack of details and specifics for Penang's public transport system shows that there is a serious lack of political commitment on the part of the state government towards improving this sector.

Even a cursory look at the notoriously irregular public bus service in Penang (carrying a low five percent of road passengers, compared to 15 percent in KL) is enough to convince most optimists of its hopelessness.

In this regard, your report which paints such a rosy picture for Penang's commuters is misleading to say the least. I hope that in the interests of accuracy you would direct your stringer to do further checks before releasing potentially propagandistic material.

For more in-depth coverage of Penang's transport see here .