ALGORITHM-INSPIRED navigators are turning out to be highly compatible with city driving in the country. Toll roads, and we have a fair number of those, provide faster alternatives, reinforcing Waze and Google Maps ‘instructions’.
With mobility from Point A to Point B being a traditional indicator of a city’s economic dynamism, Kuala Lumpur should lodge in the upper reaches of any international ranking. Combining some driving with Grab and MRT/LRT trips, one could turn up at an impressive number of meetings. A busy marketer would do well to avoid driving in Kuala Lumpur during the 5.30pm-7.30pm slot, being a period when meetings in the LRT/MRT belt would present a better option.
Malaysian road users have long pursued a 24-hour routine.
At 5.30am, a groaning Causeway welcomes its first gridlock.
Malaysian workers on motorcycles head to Singapore. Over in Negri Sembilan, those heading to workplaces in Kuala Lumpur are stirred. Up North, the Penang Bridge is a thriving link, receiving daily visitors from an expanding region of Kedah and Perak. Up and down the country, the after-office crawl throws up its distinctive set of issues when everyone is drained.
Driving in the North-South Expressway when most lorry drivers are at work requires a different skill set. The tunnels near Jelapang, Ipoh are after all a 30-year-old passage. Engineers talk loosely of an elevated stretch in this highland zone. Will planners consider an additional stretch exclusively for lorries, here?
Nationwide, lane discipline is routinely compromised. Cars blithely hug the edges, transferring strains to others. WhatsApping while driving is not frowned upon all that much, or else, newspaper pages will regularly present stories of a crackdown.
Speed driving at car parks, too, is tolerated somewhat, giving the impression stress is to be generously shared.
This little excursion has now reached the most daunting slot; traversing Malaysian roads at night. Road safety experts may need to rewrite the rules. Tailgating at 1am will unnerve the most composed of drivers. A 60-year-old driver doing 60km per hour may encounter two or more cars flying past at unbelievable speed. Stay put. Stay motionless. By shifting lanes, one may plunge into danger. We don’t learn these things in any formal manner. Fear has taught us new safeguards.
We have thus far left out the party-goers who need to go home. Also, the illegal racers and the random speedsters. And those on drugs and in varying degrees of intoxication. They are in a different zone. They may encounter lane-hogging cars, which on its part, is not a mark of politeness and caring. Not at 2am, or any other time on the super-busy highways.
The Penang Bridge incident involving what is now believed to be two childhood friends, aged 20 and 21, will form a lingering nightmare. The curfew being considered is meant for those under 18. We cannot conceivably assign traffic police on every turn, 24/7. A good, sensible start is to produce arresting documentaries on night-time driving in Malaysia.
Road fatalities engender not mere statistics and shareable videos. They relate to a failure, even a national flaw. And, that is something to mourn about in a collective dirge.