Throngs of New Year travellers begin leaving Bangkok

BANGKOK, December 30 (TNA) - Travellers have gradually crowded bus terminals in Bangkok to begin leaving the capital for their hometowns or tourist destinations during New Year holidays. Noppharat Karunyavanich, Executive Vice President for Bus Operations Business of Transport Company Limited, under the Thai Ministry of Transport, told journalists that the first batches of about 170,000-180,000 New Year travellers left Bangkok to their provincial destinations on December 29, prompting his company to increase inter-provincial bus trips from 7,200 to 8,500 daily to serve the rising number of passengers during the ongoing New Year Festival. Noppharat assessed that the number of New Year travellers who are leaving Bangkok by inter-provincial buses is expected to increase to 200,000 on December 30 and the number of daily bus trips has, thus, been further increased to 9,000 to meet the public demand, echoing his confidence that there will be enough buses to serve all inter-provincial passengers. Meanwhile, Deputy Transport Minister Pichit Akrathit said his ministry has installed close-circuit televisions (CCTVs) and dangerous objects detecting machines at bus terminals to sufficiently provide security for New Year travellers to create public confidence. Besides, his ministry has coordinated with the Deparment of Land Transport and Bangkok Mass Transit Authority (BMTA) to provide sufficient passenger buses and taxis to serve the rising public demand during the ongoing New Year Festival, stressing that there should, thus, be no travellers left behind at Bangkok's bus terminals during New Year holidays. Citing statistics last year when as high as 380 people were killed and 3,505 others were injured during New Year holidays, mostly caused by drivers' drunk-driving or over-speeding, the deputy transport minister asked for public cooperation to welcome New Year 2017 with no alcohol and not drinking when getting drunk, warning that violators will face up to one-year in jail and/or a fine of 5,000-20,000 baht each. According to the deputy transport minister, his ministry has targeted the least number of road accidents, death toll and injuries during the New Year Festival 2017 and has ordered all agencies concerned to take care of travellers with public safety standards, covering no drunk-driving, no drugs but strict compliance with traffic rules. However, the Accident Prevention and Reduction Center reported that there were 524 road accidents on December 29, the first day of the seven-day campaign to monitor road accidents during New Year holidays 2017, with 565 people injured and 42 killed, higher than 439 road accidents and 39 deaths on the first-day campaign last year. Permanent Secretary for Public Health Dr. Sophon Mekthon stated that drunk-driving and over-speeding were the major causes of Thursday's accidents, most of which or 83.09 per cent involved motorcycles. (TNA)