SMOOTH ROAD, CLEAN THROATUrban transportation planning towards better public transportation to reduce congestion in Kuala Lumpur

Malaysia has always been said as one of the highly developed countries in Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) after Singapore. The population of Greater Kuala Lumpur is however expected to reach 10 million in 5 years time (Horlic, 2012), which is nearly one-third of the Malaysia’s current population, and the growing trend of private vehicle ownership will only continue to strike a new high if there is no any other alternative transportation put in place to enhance the situation we meet now. We are commonly acknowledged that Chinese cities own the worst traffic in the world. China’s traffic jams have become headline news, including tailbacks of 100km and waits of nine days and more (Boland, n.d.). So why are the traffic jams in China so horrific? In a word, growth. The cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin and Harbin have experienced the most terrible congestion due to the unprecedented overpopulation and the need of cars for working citizens to commute in the sprawling cities. We always tell ourselves to learn from the history, so do we want to follow the wrong trail? With the vision of becoming a world-class road transport enforcement management organisation by 2020, Kuala Lumpur City Hall (KLCH) has to plan to ensure road users to experience a better road condition in the future. Hence, in order to regulate motor vehicles and road traffic safely and efficiently, KLCH has the mission of implementing the efficient, reputable and high technology enforcement and service deliveries to meet the citizens’ needs, and to ensure the welfare of the citizens comprises with the population growth. The objectives of owning a better public transport system in Kuala Lumpur is to establish and regulate the registration and licensing of motor vehicles in a systematic, reliable and innovative manner; to establish and administer the road transport law with the commitment to produce competent, law abiding and prudent drivers of motor vehicles; to enforce and administer the road transport law with integrity and commitment to create a society that has a culture of adherence to the rules of the road; and more importantly, to monitor and administer motor vehicle safety standards with efficiency and integrity to meet the needs of the environment and the country's automotive industry (Official Portal of Road Transport Department Malaysia, n.d.).

According to KLCH (3 million vehicles enter Kuala Lumpur each day, 2011), the usage of public transport in the city is less than 30% compared to the 70% on private vehicles and it is estimated that there are a staggering 3 million cars entering Kuala Lumpur daily, causing congestion owing to over-capacity. Yet, there is only an inclination of 30% of daily commuters using the public transit throughout the 5 years (Table1), which this has only slightly ameliorated the traffic congestion.

Source : Economic Planning Unit, Prime Minister’s Department,2006

Table 1: Kuala Lumpur Integrated Transit Network Average Daily Commuters

Based on the Economic Planning Unit (Table 2), the federal territory of Kuala Lumpur holds the highest vehicle ownership rate for every 1000 persons throughout the nations. However, there is another prodigious fact, on average, there are about 1,000 new vehicles being registered in Kuala Lumpur daily, and according to the new registration of private motor vehicles statistics provided by Department of Statistics Malaysia (Table 3), the difference of the newly registered motorcycles and cars are getting disparate compared to the year of 2008 and 2009 that in our aspect of view, getting new private cars is easier for the residents of Kuala Lumpur to go around in the city, and this is due to owning a driving licence is very easy and the inconvenient of using public transportation because of the long walking distance of a bus stop or a LRT station from the living areas. Yet, it is crystal clear that Kuala Lumpur has no enough car park lots to accommodate such increasing number of cars.

Source: Economic Planning Unit,2001

Table 2: Vehicle ownership rate for every 1000 persons in Malaysia by States

Source: Department of statistics Malaysia, 2010

Table 3: New Registration of Private Motor Vehicles

There are 184 cars per 1000 people in Kuala Lumpur as apposed to 45 for Hong Kong, 106 in Singapore, and 153 in Bangkok. In Kuala Lumpur the modal

share of public transport is about 20% of total person trips. In contrast, in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Tokyo the modal share is 70% or more and in Bangkok, Jakarta, and Manila the modal share of public transport is between 40 and 60% of total person trips (Schwarcz, 2003). Bear in mind that Kuala Lumpur has a higher per capita than Bangkok, Jakarta and Manila but a lower modal share of public transport. Based on TheMalaysianInsider, the punctuality of public transport services is becoming an issue to the public (Ibrahim, 2014), the delay caused from each station could accumulate and cause inconvenience and trouble which is ironic for the public transport services, which aims to provide convenience and efficient way of traveling service to the public. The punctuality of public transport have made an impression that it is not reliable and it could be one of the factor that have caused increasing car growth in Kuala Lumpur because citizens are more convinced by having their own means of transport, they could travel according to their own timeframe with ease and only have to worry about the traffic congestion.

Urban air pollution has killed more than 3.5 million people across the world every year (The Cost of Air Pollution Health Impacts of Road Transport, 2014) that it can cause health problems from asthma to heart diseases, and the road congestion has contributed to this significantly, in which it does not only give impacts towards human but also the environment. Motorcycles are the larger contributors to air pollution in Malaysia (Salem, Atiq, & Jaafar, 2011). The hydrocarbon, lead and nitrogen oxide that are released by the motor vehicles can cause severe diseases, such as asthma, chronic lung diseases and neurological defects (Kampa & Castanas, 2008). Furthermore, the increasing emission of carbon dioxide from the large number of vehicles on the road is a real concern to us because it has resulted in the global warming. All this is happening before our eyes and we should have realised that we do not have all the solutions we want. Urban Heat Island (UHI) is a metropolitan area where is a lot warmer than the rural areas surrounding it that the heat is created by energy from the people, vehicles and industrial areas. An urban area like Kuala Lumpur is densely populated where it is only a small space. UHI will suffer with the worse air and water quality compared to the neighbouring towns because there are more pollutants and waste products produced into the air and water. Additionally, Kuala Lumpur has its origin in tin mining that makes the city landscape to own the bowl-shape topography with a lower altitude. This is the matter that makes the heat energy to be trapped in Kuala Lumpur, and the heat energy and polluted air could barely flow out from the city. Hence, the car pollution of air and noise exacerbated the situation. Vehicles tend to emit more pollution during the first few miles of journey when engines are warming up, and this happens during the congestion too due to the acceleration and deceleration of car engines in a few seconds (Car Pollution - Environmental Protection UK, n.d.). Noise pollution, such as engine noise, car horns, squeaking breaks, and car stereos, will indirectly affect road users’ emotion. From the psychology aspect, traffic congestion will lead to frustration, irritation and stress mostly due to sound pollution because when people are trapped in the traffic, they are not only suffering form the static condition with noise, but more importantly, the intention of people driving a car is to get to their destinations in a shorter period of time instead of wasting their time.

The city of Kuala Lumpur is confronted with vast challenges to ensure continuous dynamism and be outstanding in the eyes of the world as an integral centre of administration, finance, industry, trade and tourism in the world. Traffic congestion will lead to the waste of time, and the time lost due to traffic jams in Kuala Lumpur could have been used for productive activities. The statement provided by The Establishment Post (2014) has indicated that Malaysia has suffered a loss of productivity in terms of time totalling RM5.51 billion annually as 10% of workers are trapped in traffic jams in Kuala Lumpur. Anchored on the principles of putting the

prosperity of the city residents first and based on the slogan ‘People First Performance Now’, KLCH is convinced that it can be successful in achieving its vision and make Kuala Lumpur a world class city by the year 2020. The idea of being a world-class city is not only an armchair strategy, the holistic development plan has been detailed through the establishment of Government Transformation Programme (GTP) with the primary focus on the Greater Kuala Lumpur.

To improve the urban public transport, there are 11 initiatives implemented in the GTP 1.0 to achieve significant progress in terms of adding capacity, and improving accessibility and connectivity of the public transportation system (Improving Urban Public Transport Overview, n.d.). Addressing the city’s chronic traffic congestion problem, KLCH has integrated with GTP to provide a reliable, affordable, convenient and integrated public transport system in Greater Kuala Lumpur, which the initiatives are grouped into 4 main categories of Bus, Rail, Integration and Network (GTP 1.0 Improving Urban Public Transport, n.d.). Firstly, increasing the capacity of inter- and intra-city trains by introducing 35 four-car sets for the Kelana Jaya LRT line in 2011, rising the daily passenger capacity to 258,156 passengers from 254,745 in 2010 because the rail usage presently contributes to about 40% of the daily public transport ridership. On the other hand, enhancing the bus experience within Kuala Lumpur and its outskirts could not be neglected. As the condition and proper maintenance of bus stops is crucial for encouraging the use of public transport, more than 1,100 bus stops were upgraded in 2011. The goal was achieved while the design and planning of 306 new bus stops are currently underway, and to complement the aesthetic enhancements of the bus stops, 470 RapidKL buses were introduced to increase the frequency of buses in Kuala Lumpur. In our opinion, because there are more than 4 million of passengers using the bus service compared to the preceding year, it is vital to promote the use of bus services for the city residents entering Kuala Lumpur from towns or residential areas nearby to ease the traffic jam especially during peak hours. To further intensify this scheme of using bus services, Pudu Sentral is refurbished and re-designated with modern facilities, and it offers better comfort and a hassle-free experience for travellers. By introducing the Integrated Transport Terminal Bandar Tasik Selatan that comprises 55 bus platforms, the bus service experience of going in and out Kuala Lumpur is once again boosted. Other than bus system, the rail system should not be ignored because it is the highest utilised mode of public transport in the country. Three major initiatives including enhancing the KTM Komuter, extending the Kelana Jaya and Ampang LRT lines, and expanding the KL Monorail capacity are the emphasis point of the programme. Thus, with the improved services, linkages of high population density areas and less bottlenecking in riding monorails will no doubt enhance our public transport whilst discouraging the use of highways by driving where they might get stuck in the traffic jams (GTP 2.0 Improving Urban Public Transport, n.d.).

The aspect of Kuala Lumpur citizens’ views has played an essential role to actually comprehend more about the concerns of them about the transportation in Kuala Lumpur. Jala (2014), the CEO of Pemandu and Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, has pointed out that public transportation must be attractive to urge people using the public transportation by the pull and push factors. Firstly, the first and last mile connectivity must feed commuters into the terminals conveniently and deliver them to their destinations on time. An efficient network of feeder buses that ply neighbourhoods and business districts, with proper park-and-ride facilities and pedestrian walkways is mandatory. Secondly, the facilities provided must be safe, clean and well maintained without burdening commuters with unjustifiable costs. Furthermore, as the network is integrated, the payment system must evolve so the commuter does not exit the commute trail to pay for a line shift. The experience must be seamless and fast. Last but not least, we are now in the digital era that a mobile

app that features real time data for commuters to plan their journeys can really save their time. They can time when they will leave their houses and how long it will take to get to their destinations. In fact, governments managing populous cities usually use policies to discourage people from driving their cars into the cities. For instance, London and Singapore introduce congestion charge or aerial pricing for people driving in the cities, in addition to high fuel price at normal market rate, without subsidies. On our interpretation, as we gradually rationalise fuel subsidies, we will naturally gravitate to the public transport as the more affordable option, and by spending less on subsidies, we can use the additional funds to upgrade terminals and pedestrian walkways, add coaches and expand the network to improve connectivity as population grows. Moreover, with fewer cars entering the central business district, city spaces can be utilised more productively instead of being allocated as car parks. We must gradually increase fares so that the company can improve its services.

Light Rail Transit (LRT) and commuter rail usage has been encouraging (Kuala Lumpur Structure Plan 2020: Transportation, n.d.). However, optimal usage has still yet to be achieved due to inadequate interchange facilities at stations including car and motorcycle parking and pedestrian linkages, interchange should have adequate parking for various means of transportation for pedestrian to park because most of the pedestrians who want to travel to the urban city do not intend to drive there because of the traffic congestion, so they opted for another type of transportation to the urban by utilising the LRT or commuter rail. During peak hours, the amount of people that utilises these public transport skyrockets into vast amount thus causing inadequate parking at the interchange. Another lacking aspect would be the lack of integration between rail-based stations, the integration poses a very important role in the convenience of rail-based transportation, say if all rail based stations are interconnected, pedestrians can depart at any station and travel to their designated location without having to travel to a certain station in order to travel to the favourable location. By linking all rail based station together, pedestrians not only have the option to travel anywhere they want from anywhere they are, they could also save the trouble of traveling to certain stations.

Source: Kuala Lumpur Structure Plan 2020, n.d.

Figure 1: The relative accessibility of bus and rail-based public transport in Kuala Lumpur

It is clear that rail-based public transport services are far less accessible than bus services and consequently (Figure 1). Their ability to service patrons in a single trip from origin to destination is very limited. The 2-kilometre radius of coverage of the

feeder buses that operate from stations is not enough to ensure sufficient accessibility. Besides, the policies act to reverse the decline in public transport usage and to achieve a targeted public: private transport modal split of 60:40 by the year 2020, this could potentially decrease the congestion in urban areas such as Kuala Lumpur and Klang Valley where most of the private cars cause the over occupied roads to congest. DBKL also aims to optimise road and rail transportation infrastructure so that is operates at its full capacity and maximum efficiency because as for now, many interchange stations have been deemed underused because of the pedestrian traffic, some interchange stations are built around rural areas where most pedestrian refuse to go, therefore leaving some interchange station underused and decreasing its efficiency.

The solutions towards the better public transportation in order to reduce the traffic congestion shall not end here. We believe that a sustainable public transportation approach should be highlighted to create the lowest negative impacts towards our environment. In the context of Kuala Lumpur city, the existing urban transport policies should be re-examined that it should not have significant deviations between policies and implementation. Singapore, with its Rapid Transit Systems, buses, taxis, its control of private vehicle ownership and usage through the Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) scheme, vehicle tax schemes and the annual quota for growth of the private vehicle fleet, is to be lauded for striking and appropriate balance between economic efficiency, satisfying demand for better transportation and managing traffic congestion (Quah & Yeo, 2010). In fact, the ERP systems in place in Singapore, the signboards of the parking guidance system, the speed-trap cameras, the proliferation of the GPSs, in totality, all provide the foundation for a more intelligent and sustainable transport system. From our point of view, beyond the safety aspects, such systems provide environmental benefits in reducing tail-pipe emissions from idling vehicles, and thus improve overall energy efficiency and fuel savings that this situation can really make a big difference in Kuala Lumpur because the traffic jams not only occur on the highways and the city centre area, but it happens daily at the toll plazas. Even if Toll Network Automatic Payment Systems (SmartTAG) or the Touch ‘n Go system could barely compete with the ERP system which does not require road users to stop and pay. The ideal distance between two cities is to be said at 40 kilometres that only this can provide an ample and sufficient space for a city to sprawl in terms of land-use planning, which consists of business district, residential areas, industrial areas, and agricultural areas with the adequate level of facilities and infrastructure like road planning to ensure that the city will never be over flooded with vehicles on the roads. There are quite a few of modal cities in Asia with great public transport systems, such as Seoul, Tokyo, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taipei. Tokyo’s public transport is known for its punctuality, efficiency and cleanliness, however in Seoul, its integrated transit network, Seoul Metropolitan Rapid Transit (SMRT), owns the longest rapid transit system in the world, 18 lines with a total length of 987.5 kilometres track running across the city’s 25 districts which consists of 512 stations (Flint, 2013). All the well-planned public transportation systems have proven to increase the efficiency of road traffic, and it is a key tool in facilitating green growth, liberating cities from the consequences of traffic congestion and enabling citizens to lead healthier lifestyles (Priority topics, 2014).

Smooth road, clean throat. A green and sustainable development of Kuala Lumpur should brook no delay, and only with the unity and integrity of government departments, private sectors, and citizens of Kuala Lumpur could achieve the aim of building suitable urban transportation system to reduce the traffic congestion that we are facing now. Caen (n.d.) once said, “A city is not gauged by its length and width, but by the broadness of its vision and the height of its dreams.”

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