LTA's graciousness campaign gains two additional cartoon members

From today, commuters travelling on public transport will be joined by two new cartoon commuters - Bag-Down Benny and Hush-Hush Hannah. The Straits Times has reported that the two new cartoon commuters have hopped on the thoughtful bandwagon to encourage passengers to make public transport more pleasant.

Benny and Hannah made its debut appearance on stickers and posters at Dhoby Ghaut MRT station today, alongside familiar characters such as: Move-in Martin, Stand-up Stacey and Give-way Glenda.

The English daily added that the two additional fictional characters were chosen from more than 800 entries received by the Land Transport Authority (LTA) via its Facebook design contest, which it ran back in June and July. The contest, spanning six months, was part of LTA's annual graciousness campaign.

Senior Minister of State for Finance and Transport, Josephine Teo, attended the awards ceremony, which opened with a song-and-dance number by students from South View Primary School. Awards were also presented to winners of the student character design contest, which saw 51 schools putting in more than 6,500 entries.

Bag-Down Benny was created by Lee Wei Seng, with his 17-year old daughter. Mr. Lee, who uses the train on occasion to commute between work and home, told the English daily commuters travelling with larger bags should place them on the ground so they don't block the path of others. This observation was also perhaps his inspiration for Bag-Down Benny.