So if people are not willing to drive their cars during ERP hours, they'll drive them when there's no ERP then. It appears that there's more cars on the road, because when u drive, most ppl are probably driving at the same time as you. if you drive during the peak hours then u'll notice the reduction in traffic say, when u pay $3 to enter CBD at 6.15pm.
ERP won't reduce the number of cars on the road. It just reduces the number of cars during the time the ERP is activated. The general cost of ERP only affects a relatively small percentage of people who regularly chalk up large ERP bills travelling in and out of CBD. I dont think the morning highway charges are high enough to really deter the bulk of the crowd.
IMO one root of the problem lies in the cost of owning a car. there are low barriers to purchasing and owning one. nowadays u have payment schemes where there's zero downpayment + cash rebate, it makes ppl think only of the monthly installment rather than the total amount paid off. so for say $900 a mth, u could drive home a spanking new Lancer with extra maybe 10k in your pocket. Major feel-good factor. then after buying the car, nobody's gonna just park in the garage. ERP and petrol costs are high, but oh well, a car's meant to be driven so, drive it is. When there's a will, there's a way. it is not difficult to scrimp and save a few dollars here and there to make up for the rise in ERP/petrol.
then for those who feel the pinch enough to leave the car at home and take public transport, they squeeze on the trains with the ever-increasing population of foreign talent. and then you have the privatised 'public transport'. A profit-maximising firm seeks to increase efficiency and reduce fixed costs, hence lower the frequency of trains until every single train is fully packed. Pull trains from off-peak hours to bolster the peak hours so as to please the rush hour crowd. but the total number of trains running per day remains more or less the same so that operating costs dont increase. off-peak commuters are thus affected but they are the minority. can't please everybody at the expense of profits. (i have nothing against profit-maximising; SMRT is a private firm and thus has the right to do so)
Just my 2 cents.
