Traffic congestion, why the big deal?

24 October 2011, 1.00am

Wow, what a day! Rugby World Cup Final, Manchester Derby, Marco Simoncelli incident, QPR beats Chelsea. Great day. However, a day could be ruined by, yeah u guessed it, traffic jam!

I'm one of the active road users in Malaysia. Cities in Malaysia are suffering from chronic traffic jam, yeah from an article in TheStar dated 21 October 2011. Kuching, Penang, KL, Johor, u name it. In mythbusters, they pointed out 3 reasons why traffic jams could happen.

1. Traffic density

It's when number of cars are too packed. For example in India, the number of cars are more than the population itself.

2. Speed of cars travelling

Slow=Cars closely packed, thus increase the density.

3. Type of cars

Longer wheelbase (longer cars) will contribute to traffic jam. Look at roads with lorries and trucks. What do you see? Traffic jam! :P...

Somehow this 3 factors are related to one another.

Therefore I believe to tackle this problem, the state government should take this problem seriously. My travelling time from my home to the airport during peak hours could reach up to 1.5 hrs, seriously when compared to 20 mins off-peak hours. I proposed few steps in tackling this problem in Kuching:

1. Widening the road

2. Enforcing police traffic during peak hours

3. Smart traffic light system

4. ITIS in Kuching, not just in KL

5. Traffic reports on radios (Hitz.fm is doing it now)

6. Making alternative routes accessible

Encountering traffic jam is not fun! I still remember when I was driving with my daughter and Naqqy to Mira's open house in Shah Alam, the traffic was, horrible! 3km highway stretch took us almost an hour to reach!

Anyways, I know we can't compare with UK, Australia, Germany and even our neighbour Singapore, in terms of traffic management, but I believe our government can do something to tackle this problem.