Traffic Consultative Council member Kou Kun Pang, who also heads the Civil and Environmental Engineering Department of the University of Macau (UM), said yesterday that building a Light Rail Transit (LRT) system on the peninsula was the only way to tackle the city’s traffic woes.
He made the remarks on the sidelines of a forum about the government’s plan to build the LRT peninsula section, held by the Macau Institution of People’s Alliance (API).
According to Kou, the number of vehicles in Macau has risen 70 per cent over the past 10 years, while public buses carry an estimate of 600,000 people daily.
“There is hardly any space left on the peninsula to build more roads,” said Kou, adding that building the LRT on the peninsula would be the best way to solve the city’s transportation problems.
“The construction of the Taipa section is a valuable and expensive experience,” said Kou, adding that it “would be a waste to shelve the Macau [peninsula] section.” He said the government could take the Taipa section as reference when building its counterpart on the peninsula.
Chief Executive Fernando Chui Sai On has said that the government will announce its decision on the LRT peninsula route by the end of this year.
Some legislators have urged the government to scrap the peninsula section of the project.
(Macau News / The Macau Post Daily)
