Improving Urban Public Bus Service Quality
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1122 Int. J Sup. Chain. Mgt Vol. 9, No. 2, April 2020 Improving Urban Public Bus Service Quality: A Review of the Performance Benchmarking Syazwan Baharum#1, Suria Haron*2, #* Faculty of Civil Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Permatang Pauh, Pulau Pinang, MALAYSIA #[email protected] *[email protected] Abstract— Malaysian nowadays prefer more on investment on public transportation. One of the private transport such as car and motorcycle priorities that should be given is to improve the compared to public bus. This decision may be due to current service quality of public bus. The public personal experience when the services do not meet the bus service should be updated from time to time in expected satisfaction. Understanding the key factors order to encourage road users to use public bus of bus performance is important because it services [3]. Hence, the main focus of this study is related users’ loyalty and ridership issue. However, current practice in Malaysia does not focus on to review the past study about quality attributes developing and implementing an urban transport used for analysis service quality of urban bus. benchmarking. The authorities and the operators Many benefits that can be generated by the nation need to take a transparent action with an intense when the development of an efficient transportation understanding of user needs in order system can be reached. The objective of reducing to enhance the public bus service for foreseeable congestion on the roads should be rigged with more future. This article reviews an approach that public bus ridership. Public transportation is acknowledged by previous studies in an interest of capable of carrying larger number of passengers assisting public bus transportation planning that and is one of method that can offer urban advantage of sustainable public transportation system. sustainability [4]. Keywords— Urban Public Bus, Users’ Satisfaction, Performance Benchmarking. 2. Issues with Public Bus Service 1. Introduction Issues relating to the quality of public services in Malaysia cause annoying affect to passengers [5]– Rapid urbanization has increased the growth of the [7]. The effect can be seen when the services Malaysian economy. World Bank (2015), reported provided had less support from local community. that the percentage of urbanization continues to Public buses are facing several issues and the most increase steadily every year after Malaysia became debate is the reduction in the number of ridership in a middle-income country in 1985 [1]. The growth the rural and even urban area [8], [9]. In Kuantan, in population and migration to major cities have a Rapid Kuantan bus has been operating for five positive impact on increasing the country’s years received numerous of issues. Among the economy through increased in productivity and concerns are the bus takes too much time to arrive accelerating in the services sector. The economic at destination that takes more than two hours. stability of the urban region also became the driver When compared to a car ride that is only takes of growth in household incomes and poverty about 30 minutes. In addition, a basic facility such reduction. However, despite the advantages of the as bus stops without a roof, the aspect of urbanization can be seen, it also has emergent cleanliness, dangerous driving, punctuality and challenges in the mobility that dampen the others [10]. In Penang mainland, study by [8] found ambition of becoming a high-income nation. that reliability of buses is not reliant only on the Malaysia’s becomes exceptionally high bus frequency but also subjective by the travel motorization rate [2] . In addition, the existence of speed, level of traffic congestion, weather some shortcomings in the public transport service conditions, volume of passenger per returned trip quality has reduced the travel using public and number of stop. Their finding proposed that an transport. Therefore, aware of this difficulty, the effective urban bus service ought to have an government now turns attention to give extra efficient route network, which entails accessible for ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ International Journal of Supply Chain Management IJSCM, ISSN: 2050-7399 (Online), 2051-3771 (Print) Copyright © ExcelingTech Pub, UK (http://excelingtech.co.uk/) 1123 Int. J Sup. Chain. Mgt Vol. 9, No. 2, April 2020 high density housing area, short travel distance and service. However, [15] suggests that customer fulfils passenger’s needs. In Penang Island, [11] satisfaction surveys supposed to be conducted found that the public buses are not effective enough annually or every six months basis to monitor to attract people to choose over private transport. consumer perceptions of the existing public Despite various efforts by local authorities and bus transport services. More completely, several operators, apparently not as effective as the use of service qualities attributes of public transport public buses among working people is less. From services can be found in Table 1. the analysis of consumer satisfaction, problems concerning the frequency of buses led majority Table 1: Service quality attributes in previous respondents (79.15%) were unhappy about the studies public bus service. This situation reflects the poor Author Public Country Factors/Dimensio frequency of bus arrivals and departures. Haron et Transport ns al., (2015) discovered service quality dimension category that affects the public bus performance in Penang de Oña et Urban Bus Granada, Frequency, are Image, Physical Facilities, Reliability, al., 2013 Spain Punctuality, Speed, Proximity, Accessibility, Safety, Responsiveness and Fare, Environment [5]. Public transportation in Kuala Cleanliness, Lumpur offers wide range of choice such as rails Space, Temperature, and bus transport. Public bus service is usually Information, preferred because it offers lower fares than others Safety, Courtesy, Accessibility [12]. Similar situation happened in Kuala Lumpur’s public bus in which the quality of facility is poor Del Urban Bus Bilbao, Frequency, travel Castillo & Spain time, punctuality, with availability and network coverage possess Benitez prices, enormous gaps, unreliable services, waiting time (2012) information, and punctuality of buses arrive. This problem arises cleanliness, staff performance, when lack of planning in the provision of bus comfort and services and lack coordinated planning [13]. safety Therefore, it is better to know the level of service Guirao et Urban Bus Bilbao, Frequency, travel quality at the initial stage in order to enhance it in al., 2016 Spain time, punctuality, prices, accordance with the requirements of passengers information, [10]. cleanliness, staff performance, comfort and 3. Methodology safety Guirao et Urban Bus Madrid, Punctuality, al., 2016 Spain Frequency, A structured questionnaire assessment of customer access, Cleanliness, satisfaction in Malaysia’s urban public transport Journey was done earlier by [14], using attributes of time, Comfort, information Accessibility, Reliability, Safety, Fares, Shaaban & Urban Bus Doha, Comfort, Communication and Trip Experience. A total of 63 Khalil, Qatar convenience, respondents from a regular public transport user 2013 safety, and cleanliness was pre-tested for content validity. Accordingly, Yao et al., Urban Bus Kuantan, Tangibility, the final assessment was conducted at numerous 2014 Malaysia Reliability, Responsiveness, bus and train stations around Klang Valley area. A Assurance, total of 467 questionnaires was collected which Emphaty 82% of respondents were common users. The result Tour bus Bangkok, Vehicle Driver Jomnonkw Thailand and crew show that attributes of safety, followed by ao & Management accessibility, reliability, communication and trip Ratanavara ha, experience influence customer satisfaction. Study 2016 done by [9], four dimensions compromise of tangible, reliability, responsiveness and assurance For urban bus category, several researchers coming are expand in 17 items to capture the satisfaction out with evaluating the quality of service perceived level in Peninsular Malaysia urban and rural bus by users. According to [16], Structural Equation 1124 Int. J Sup. Chain. Mgt Vol. 9, No. 2, April 2020 Model (SEM) method used to discover the identifying parameters that may affect the unobserved latent characteristics describing the satisfaction of public transport users in Malaysia. service and the relationships between these features The proposed assessment framework is expected to with the overall service quality. They found that the be widely applied as a methodological strategy to unobserved latent variable is most important, while assess public opinion in the post-evaluation stage comfort and frontline personnel have less influence of large infrastructure projects. towards overall service quality. While, the methodology for identifying and measuring the Acknowledgments relationship between the assessment given to the overall satisfaction and which is given to certain The authors would like to express appreciation to Ministry of Education Malaysia for having factor of a particular service or rating is presented delivered resources Fundamental Research Grant by [17]. Scheme (FRGS). Special thanks to anonymous mediators from Rapid Penang bus agency for their Finally, the overall model of the satisfaction index permission, understanding, and the information in the