Morning Race

Traffic before and After Sg. Besi Toll (towards KL)

Apparently, every morning there is a race along the North-South Highway which starts as early as 6.30 a.m. I am not aware of this race before until I have to travel to KL City Centre a few times a month recently for the next one year or so to go to work.

Traffic jam just after Sg. Besi Toll (towards KL) at 6.50 a.m.

I have to leave Bandar Seri Putra (Putra Mahkota Toll, PMT) by 6.30 a.m. if I were to arrive at the Mid-Valley area before 7.30 a.m. If I leave PMT after 6.30 a.m, I will arrive at Mid-Valley at 7.45a.m. or later depending on how I drive, the behaviour of other drivers, the attitude and mood of 'Emergency Left Lane' drivers, weather condition, road repair, etc.

So, when I travel to KL at 6.30 a.m, I will never miss a highway race from PMT to KL. Most of the cars travel at 110 km/h and some even sppeding at more than 120 km/h. The speed limit between Bangi Toll and Sg. Besi Toll of 90 km/h has never been acknowledge at this time of the day (may be the day is still dark...).

Unfortunately, immediately after the Sg. Besi Toll, there is normally a traffic jam towards Kuala Lumpur. The reason being very simple.. the no. of lanes is reduced from 8 - 10 (toll booths) to 3 or sometimes 2 (for Road Repair or Traffic Police Road Block). It is an accepted norm nowadays that some of the causes of the traffic jam is caused by the presence of police traffic by the road sides.
The matter is also made worse by the unscrupulous contractor who is carrying out repair works without considering the time of heavy traffic using the highway. We can sometimes see that one or two of the lanes were closed but there was no activity at all for 1 or 2 km along the lanes that were closed !! Of course the closure is for safety reasons..!!??

View from the highway just before Sg. Besi Toll (north bound)

So, if you are a regular traveller to KL every morning, please make sure that you don't join the race. We could drive normally to work, appreciate the beauty of the world around us, zikr while driving and pray to Allah that He will bestow us with better rizk in days to come ... Ameen..

Highway Commuter