Hiring Courtesy Helper instead of paying for courtesy advertisements

There seems to be an ongoing campaign on our mass media to be polite, courteous on our public transport, for example, to give way to alighting passengers, rather than pushing your way into the train.

Kudos to the relevant authority for posting such reminders, as long as it is not a habit of Singaporeans, we need gentle reminders to be a polite society.

However, instead of paying good sums of money for advertisement on mass media (which i presume would amount to quite a heft figure), I think it would be much more cost effective to hire senior citizens, donning simple uniforms, to serve as MRT staff at the platforms.

They will just smile and give gentle reminders to passengers to queue up, and to let alighting passengers alight first before boarding the trains.

I believe a real human giving such gentle reminders is more effective at getting people to stop their nasty habits and cultivate better ones. When the staff is there everyday, the usual commuters would eventually get used to those better polite habits, so that eventually society would be a better one, and these society would be no longer needed.

Pardon me if I am wrong, I am assume a mass media campaign would probably costs $200,000? Assuming you just hire some staff (can be senior citizens or students) on a part time basic during peak hours, with a wage of about $1000? That would be 200 additional staff all across stations in Singapore.

(I know my figures may be wrong, but it would be around there)

I think it would be much better than blasting advertisements that we all ignore.

Also, these staff can help out in additional duties such as providing directional helps to lost commuters, a source of help in minor crisis, guide people to correct place in term of peak hour breakdowns (not that unusual nowadays) and help to maintain cleanliness.

Beside, it would have a bonus of employing more senior citizens students and giving them extra duties in society.