The Yemenite Step* of the Israeli public transportation
The Israeli public transportation has made an important achievement recently with the operation of a large number of night bus lines within Haifa, Jerusalem and Tel Aviv as well as between the latter and a few other surrounding cities.
Initially published on early June on the Tel Aviv mayor blog, these join the night trains going from Nahariya to the Ben-Gurion Airport, effectively connecting Haifa and Tel Aviv (along with some other destinations en route).
Past years saw similar project pilots in Haifa and Jerusalem, and this time quite some effort has been put in planning these lines and mostly – promoting this project. The key element of this campaign is the service for going out. However, due to the famous status quo – an old agreement that regulates aspects of civil life and the Jewish religion in Israel – the only time those buses don’t operate are Friday nights – when they’re most needed to prevent car accidents and drunk driving (not to mention easing traffic and parking around the nightlife spots and also cutting costs).
Haifa remains an exception to that, practically proving both the (political) feasibility and the importance of public transportation on weekends. But this time, Holon’s mayor decided to follow suit and have the bus line from his city to Tel Aviv running on Friday night as well. So far, judging by the non-reflecting talkbacks, this decision is widely hailed.
But in order for Israel to join the modern world (and this term includes also countries like Hungary, Croatia, Egypt, Turkey and India which are sometimes referred to as “third-world countries”), this initiative must not end, or minimize, on September 1st. Night bus lines are a common standard for public transportation.
In fact, the Israeli authorities have lately proved again how systematically they oppose modernization that is so trivial in “the West” – to which Israelis always claim to belong. Based on long outdated perception, it took the Supreme Court more than three years to come to the odd conclusion that crowded city buses are actually no problem. Moreover, “in the world of rights and human respect, the public transportation is first and foremost in the use of those who are not among the rich and wealthy, and in the use of the youth, people whose economic situation hasn’t improved, the elders who live from pension, who are not from the economic and social middle and upper classes – saying that, we add our voice to a certain message of social equality; while the private car owner drives his car, the bus passenger will travel safely and in comfort.”
A recently published report by the State Comptroller concerning the same issue came to the opposite conclusions, stating the bus companies failed in following their obligations and the ministry of transportation failed overseeing them.
But this clearly capitalistic mindset behind the court decision simply proves that the honorable judges haven’t gone on a bus since their time in school – and that they actually believe this should be the situation: cars for the rich and buses for the poor. And indeed, with the level of service the bus companies in Israel provide – no wonder the vast majority of their customers are those who have no other alternatives. But it couldn’t be more hypocrite to claim contribution to “social equality” when the state has already abolished its subsidy for public transportation.
And that’s not all. In the same ruling, the judges also approved arguments raised by the bus companies and the ministry of transportation, according to which “setting a limit on the number of standing passengers on city buses might have negative implications from the aspects of environment and traffic load”. However, the environment and traffic load are among the best reasons to significantly enhance the use of public transportation, and buses in particular. After all, if indeed limiting the number of people standing in buses will result in enlarging the buses fleets, thus improving the service, that might be one important step for promoting the use of public transportation – among all socio-economic levels of the society – thus, easing the traffic loads and necessarily making a real contribution to the environment (by cutting CO2 emissions of private cares). But go figure.
The ministry of transportation, however, is excelling in its consistent primitive approach. A novelty bill that aims at an extensive reform for encouraging the use of bikes has already gained the support of more than half of the Knesset Members but now faces fierce opposition from the ministry of transportation. The latter objects to the chapter which allows bicycles onboard intercity buses and trains, arguing they will harm the other passengers “due to the space they require”, also in the luggage compartments.
Bikers have been campaigning for letting bikes on trains for a few years now, so far with not much success. And again, while Israel constantly sees itself as part of the “western world”, it fails – namely, stubbornly objects – making progress. Numerous countries around the world have already realized the great benefit in the use of bikes and public transportation as well as their clear advantage over private cars. A variety of implementing solutions are out there – all proved successful. But, without trying to speculate any other reasons for that – be it political or other personal interests – it seems like the narrow-minded Israeli officials simply have to re-invent the wheel themselves, and necessarily as a square.
* A Yemenite Step means taking one step forward and two backwards. And it really is a folk dance (which I never tried).
