Take Mass Transit. The best way to avoid contributing to traffic congestion is to take mass transit.

When
travelling around town, jump on a bus or train instead of in your car. Taking mass transit can be faster, cheaper,
and more relaxing. It also helps minimize environmental damage caused by excessive car use.
Try Active Transportation. Active transportation (walking, jogging, roller blading, riding a bicycle, etc.) is
another great way of reducing congestion. Active transportation takes cars off roads and is the most cost
effective means of transportation for short distances. This is also an easy way to improve your health, cut your
gas bill and save the environment.
If you ride in the street, don't obstruct or confuse motorized traffic needlessly. Stay to the slow side of the road
as long as it's safe and practical. Signal your turns.
Combine Active Transportation and Mass Transit. If your destination is too far away for active transportation or
mass transit alone, combine the two to increase your commuting range allowing you to ride to and from the
transit stops nearest your destination. Many mass transit systems are designed with cyclists in mind with racks
on the fronts of buses, bike lockers at major stops, or even entire train cars designated for bicycle storage during
travel. Check and see what options are available for combining active transportation and mass transit in your
area!

Pay attention. Sounds obvious, but most drivers are zoned out in their own little worlds, paying little attention to
what's going on, even a car-length or two ahead of them. Start making an active effort to stay alert by scanning
ahead as far as you can see. Your peripheral vision will take care of what isn't directly ahead of you. Watch for
slowing ahead for road hazards and for accidents or other problems at the road side. Anticipate slowdowns and
back off or downshift even if you are driving an automatic. Don't be a brake tapper on the freeway. It can cause
a ripple effect for miles. If you see a road hazard, such as debris in the road, call your local law enforcement
agency through a non emergency line and report the hazard. The sooner someone reports a problem, the less
impact it will have on the commute. See also How to Practice Zen Driving.
If someone is creating a minor problem through not paying attention remind them with a brief toot of the horn
and don't worry about it if it isn't resolved to your satisfaction. Use a long, loud honk only for danger.
Plan ahead. When you will be using a freeway junction or exiting the freeway, entering or exiting the carpool or
express lanes, don't wait until the last minute to merge over. You don't have to get over miles ahead, but merging
smoothly keeps traffic flowing.
Use the "zipper method" to merge. The "Zipper method" of merging utilizes the entire roadway and ensures a
smooth and even merge of 2 lanes of traffic by alternating between the two lanes. Instead of racing to the end of
the merge lane, or merging prematurely before the end of the lane, drivers in the merging lane should continue
to the end of the lane at a speed that is matched to the second lane. Drivers in the second lane should then allow
the merging lane to alternate one for one as they merge together into a single lane. Racing to the end of the
merging lane infuriates other drivers, and merging prematurely creates a situation that inefficiently uses the
roadway. Smoothly alternate one for one with the "zipper method."
Thru Traffic, Thru Lanes. Often, congestion occurs simply from drivers passing through an area driving in the
merge lanes. This results in the potential for unnecessary congestion for mergers. If you don't plan to exit the
freeway you are driving on, stay in the thru lane or fast lane(s). When your exit is the next up, simply shift your
car into the lane necessary to exit the freeway. This will likely also shave time off your commute! Please keep in
mind the Keep Right Except to Pass laws that exist in many states [1]. These laws are not just for safety, they also
help expedite the overall traffic. If you are camping in the left lane and cars are having to pass you on the right,
you are contributing to the congestion. Use the left lane to pass, then move back to the right.

Accelerate briskly from stop lights. After stopping at one of a series of stop lights in a city or elsewhere with
many stop lights, accelerate briskly to and, particularly if you are starting late from toward the back of a queue,
the speed limit. Then, with luck, you can continue at the speed limit through many stop lights which are
generally synchronized to let a batch of cars going that fast through.
Accelerate "briskly" as economy cars go, not at full power in a fast car, and do not follow too closely. It could be
unexpected and dangerous.
Anticipate slowdowns on city streets. If there are multiple lanes in the same direction, choose a center lane to go
straight because the others can back up with cars turning left and right. If there are only two, glance ahead for
signs of slowing traffic, maintain some distance in front, and signal and prepare to turn if you see a backup.
Even if you can't find an opening to safely change lanes yourself, you will help direct traffic around the
obstruction.
Don't rubberneck. When there's an accident or a breakdown on the side of the road, stopping (or slowing down)
to take a look is the worst thing you can do. Remember, it creates a log jam that prevents emergency vehicles
from getting help to the injured, and it slows down everyone behind you. Consider how you would feel if you or
your mother or child were victims of the accident. You would want those paramedics at the accident site
instantly, not stuck in traffic while strangers gawked at the unfolding tragedy. Traffic collisions may be
interesting and compelling to see, but slowing down to look causes huge traffic jams that can take hours to clear.
And if it's just a roadside breakdown, let's face it: we've all seen what a flat tire or a steaming radiator looks like.
The last thing everyone needs is one more person slowing down to take a picture or video, or just a really long,
nosy look.
Pull over quickly and completely if you have a problem. If your car begins to break down, move to the slow
lane if you can, slow down, and pull over as soon as it's safe to do so. A flat tire can do terrible damage to the
rest of your car if you attempt to continue driving on it, and almost any car trouble is made worse by allowing
the engine to run until it actually breaks down and quits. Pull over and stop your car, then signal or use your cell
phone to get help immediately. In metropolitan areas like Los Angeles, you can call 311 to get emergency help
even if you don't have something like AAA.
Avoid the temptation to talk on the phone, text, put make-up on, or read the newspaper even if traffic is
moving very slowly. Texting or reading, or doing other things that require your attention is inconsiderate to other
drivers who must then either honk to wake you up to the rest of the world, or wait until you wake on your own.
The idea is to remain alert enough to keep traffic flow moving as best it can. Remember: in most jurisdictions, it
is now illegal to talk/text on your phone or even fiddle with a GPS unit while in traffic.
Don't react to aggressive or rude behaviors of others. Some of these people can work on your last nerve, but
reacting by returning the "favor" of slamming on your brakes just as you get in front of them, or by attempting
to cut them off to repay them for cutting you off will just make things worse for everyone. It's also dangerous.
Rage shootings and collisions may be rare, but they do happen. Don't give anyone a reason to pull anythingon
you. Flipping the bird or screaming at others does not help. It only focuses an already aggressive, perhaps
dangerously so, person's rage on you. If you can make some sort of sign for "I'm sorry," do it. Nothing lets the
air out of a big gasbag faster than just apologizing, whether you did anything wrong or not. There's no matter of
principle to uphold, and it's not a race -- you just want to get home in one piece.
Drive courteously. When you can see someone signalling - or even drifting - for another lane, fall back if your
front grill is behind the driver of that car. If you are neck and neck, either speed up to allow the other driver in
behind you, or if you are verygallant, fall back and "block" for him. If you slow a bit to allow that driver to
come in ahead of you, traffic will recover almost instantly. If you try to speed ahead to let him in, and he also
tries to speed ahead of you, eventually one of you will have to give way. Don't play this sort of "chicken" game.
Let him in and keep traffic moving, rather than forcing him to rudely wedge himself in front of you, or worse,
nearly forcing him off the road if the lane is ending. So many drivers seem to feel that allowing another to
change into their lane from an adjacent one is somehow a "loss." You're all travelling to some destination; the

driver next to you is not going to win a prize if he finishes "ahead" of you. It's not a race; just let him have the
lane.
Relax! If you find you are constantly frustrated, eyes bulging and angry, every single time you have to make
your commute, try to remember: there is little you alone can do to alleviate traffic congestion. All you can do is
change your own attitude. If your daily commute causes your blood pressure to rise every day, consider
changing jobs or moving closer to work. Or, simply accept that traffic is going to be a hassle and just use the
time on the road for reflection and relaxation. Take audio books or music along - an audio book can be quite
involving, and if you can get into it, can make your commute much more enjoyable due to your interest in
finding out what happens next.
Be cool. You have a lot of power here. Use your power for good. When someone else wants a lane ahead of you,
graciously fall back and let him have it. When someone else makes a mistake, remember that you have also
made mistakes - you've overshot where you wanted to be and pulled a crazy U-ie where you shouldn't have.
You've pulled out into traffic causing someone to lay on their horn as they nearly ploughed into you. Others
have had to step on their brakes hard to avoid hitting you - or they probably will at some point if they haven't
yet. When someone else pulls a bonehead maneuver in front of you, let them go without retaliation. Don't rub it
in. Smile and wave, or if you must, make a silent "tsk tsk" gesture as you wag a warning finger at them to let
them know they've just narrowly escaped a real problem. But let it go at that and settle back into your ride.

WHAT do you dislike most in your daily life? For me, I dislike going to bed late, I dislike interruption during
meeting, and I dislike not having enough time to exercise.
Each of us will have a different list of dislikes. However, I am sure there is one thing that all of us dislike yet
most of us would have to do it twice a day, that is spending one to four hours per day, and at least five days a
week.
You may have guessed right... Its the traffic jam that we go through every day especially in the cities. When we
think about all the dislikes, we usually look for options to reduce the occurrence of such events.
Unfortunately, traffic jams are something unavoidable, and we need to deal with them almost every day.
Newly-released data by the Malaysian Automotive Association (MAA) showed that the total number of vehicles
sold last year was 655,793, an increase of 4.5% compared with 2012. It was the fourth consecutive year that car
sales had exceeded MAAs forecast of 600,000 units. MAA expects the volume to reach 670,000 in 2014.
What a notable figure it is. The growth of car sales is higher than our countrys population growth of about 1.5%
every year. Imagine over 600,000 cars added to existing roads every year. Our road expansion will never be able
to keep up with the growth of cars. We can only expand most of the roads in peripheral areas only. However,
people will still need to travel on the main roads towards the city and that is where traffic begins to build up.
Currently, our public transportation system has not been able to catch up with development. About 88% of the
population are dependent on private vehicles and 12% on public transport. As a result, private vehicles become
an important transport mode and traffic jams have become a thorn in urban living. Our dislike task is still
sticking along whenever we travel.
The heavy traffic jams are costing the nation a huge price in terms of efficiency and productivity to our national
economy. To put it in perspective, imagine each of us wasting an average of two hours in traffic jams every day,
100,000 people will be wasting 200,000 hours or 8,333 days, equivalent to 22.8 years. If one million people
were to be stuck in traffic jams for two hours per day, that would be 2 million hours wasted, which is 83,333
hours or 228 years. If we further divide this into 8 working hours per day, it equals to the wastage of 10,416
man-days, solely due to an average of two hours traffic jam per day.

That is how much time we are wasting on the road every day depending on the number of vehicles and people
trapped in the jams. The situation will become worse as the number of vehicles increase.
To march towards KLs vision of becoming a world-class city and the goal of growing the Klang Valley
population from 6 million to 10 million by 2020, the above is the price we cannot afford to pay. It is critical for
the relevant parties to put in more effort to improve and expand our public transportation system.
It is a good initiative that we have started working on the MRT system in the Klang Valley in recent years.
However, there is still a lot of catch-up to do. Other considerations include adding more MRT lines other than
the proposed three, and to develop a comprehensive and connected public transport system such as using mini
buses, executive buses and others, for people to travel by public transport without having to depend on private
vehicles.
In many cities around the world, they even offer free public transport to reduce traffic jam. For example, there is
free tram service in inner Melbourne, Australia, and free hop-on-hop-off bus trolleys along the 2km to 3km main
pedestrian street mall in Denver, US.
According to reports, the sales of passenger vehicles in our country reached RM74.85bil in 2012. Ten years
later, the value may be depreciated to only 10% or RM748.5mil based on car insurance or accounting practice of
10% to 20% annual depreciation.
The amount of the above car sales alone is sufficient to build three MRT lines similar to the size of the Sg
Buloh-Kajang line, in which the cost is estimated to be in the region of RM23bil. If only we have a magic
formula to reduce half of the purchase, and re-channel ten years of this sales amount to build public
transportation system, we will have sufficient MRT networks for many generations to come. After all, the
London underground system has been in existence for more than 100 years.
We understand that life is not a bed of roses. However, we hope not to sit on the thorns of roses every day. To
achieve our dream of becoming a world-class city and enjoy the ease of mobility, we need to have a more
aggressive plan for our public transportation system, and the right time is now.

I had the opportunity to drive from Kuala Lumpur to Penang on the second day of Hari Raya I was really
terrified to see the volume of traffic on the PLUS north-south highway all the way from KL to Penang.I dread to
imagine how it would be over the weekend after the Raya holidays.
The highway itself was congested with cars and this became worse towards the evening. All the rest areas were
so packed with cars that I could hardly pass through let alone parking ,easing myself and having some food or
drink. All the R&R areas restaurant jejantas(Sg.Buloh),Tapah, Sg.Perak and Gunung Semanggol were
similarly over-crowded with people and cars.
I just wonder what will it be like ten years from now when the increased in population would result in a twofold increase in the number of cars. Can we cope by building more highways? If we keep building more and
more highways and roads to cater for the ever increasing population of cars and motorcycles, soon our country
would become a land of roads and highways with hardly any space for the cultivation of food.
The main problem here is too many motor vehicles on the road resulting in congestion and whatever measures
we take to reduce road accidents will be futile. Minor human errors are inevitable however careful one is while
on the road. Although the error is minor but the result can be fatal as is the case in the majority of the accidents
on our roads.
There are numerous steps that we can take to reduce accidents and the mortality associated with them. The one
most important measure is to reduce the number of vehicles on our roads at all times particularly during festive

seasons .Some of the ways to do this are:

Avoid unnecessary travel especially during festive time. The people must be educated to discourage traveling
during festive period. Family visits can be done throughout the year, why cramp into the two or three days.
Not to give extended leave for festivals
Avoid granting extended school holidays for major festivals. The recent adjustment of school holidays for
deepavalli and raya was unnecessary and an abuse of privilege.
Seriously consider improving and upgrading our public transport system. Intra-city and inter city public
transport system must be enhanced. These must be safe, efficient and affordable. It is pointless to have
campaigns to promote the use of public transport when we do not have an efficient system on the ground.
To have separate lanes for motor cyclists in all major towns and cities.
Unless the government consider these measures very seriously and take steps to implement them immediately,
lives will continue to be lost in this battlefield of ours called ROADS.