COMMUNITY PROBLEM SOLVING PROJECT

Project F: Car Use for Transporting Children to and from Schools

By students: Hjh Suraini Bte Hj Shahir and Dk Tuty Shahrina Pg Hj Mat Said

Problems:
Motor vehicles have come to play an extremely important role in people’s lives as they
greatly increase their mobility. Vehicle ownership in Brunei is high (3rd highest in the
world). Brunei’s annual gasoline consumption, no doubt helped by the low price of fuel,
is four times higher than the world’s average consumption. The main reason for the use
of cars in Brunei is the need to transport children to and from schools. During the peak
hours, traffic congestion is quite a big problem. The increase in the volume of traffic
causes an increase in energy consumption. Furthermore, the increased time spent in the
transportation of children means that parents are late for work. Also, oil is a non-
renewable resource and Brunei faces oil depletion in the near future. In addition, the
carbon dioxide emitted from the burning of petrol contributes to global warming and the
greenhouse effect. The burning of petrol also releases nitrogen oxides and sulphur oxides
into the atmosphere, which causes acid rain.

Figure 1. Traffic at 5.30pm after both Sekolah Ugama Lambak Kanan and Sekolah
Rendah Dato Marsal finish their afternoon session.
 COMMUNITY PROBLEM SOLVING PROJECT

Figure 2. Traffic is observable in the front of a housing area.

Possible solutions:
Policies for transportation service should be changed. Public transportation should be
developed and the public should be encouraged to use it. Public transportation should be
improved as a response to social needs e.g. ensuring the safety of school children by
making sure that all the drivers are well-trained and experienced. Changes in land
transport rules and regulations should be made e.g. limiting the number of private motor
cars owned by a family, limiting the number of imported motor vehicles, reviewing the
issuing of driving licenses. Grants should be issued to schools for the use of school buses,
thereby making it easy for students to use public transport to get to school. The public
should be informed of procedures for grants for transport of children. Gasoline costs
should reflect economic and social costs. Public transport systems and services should be
developed and enhanced to encourage the public to use them e.g. punctual operation of
buses to ensure their effectiveness and efficiency, upgrading the quality of the bus
services by ensuring that they are comfortable. Measures for environmental protection
relating to motor vehicles should be implemented.
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Actions taken:
Project members wrote to local authorities asking them to provide more school buses.
An article was published in the local newspaper requesting that authorities address the
problems of non-sustainable practices in the transportation of school children and
encourage the use of buses.

Figure 3. Article made by students to show their finding on High Car Ownership in
Brunei (Published in The Brunei Times: Tuesday 31st October 2006).