One of the worst things about driving is not only getting stuck in traffic but after you managed to brave through the congestion, you go round and round looking for a parking spot. Usually if you’re in a popular area then well, good luck because it could take you ages to find a place to park your car.
Source: Star Property
Ultimately, this leads to our notorious Malaysian culture of double parking, and sometimes it gets so bad that we find places where people actually triple park! You’re bound to have seen it before! To add insult to injury, sometimes when you thought you found a parking space, it turns out that there’s actually a small car there. No thanks all Kancils and Kelisas!
While it feels like we’ve aged a million years looking for an empty spot, a study done by global firm Boston Consulting Group (BCG) known as “Unlocking Cities,” reveals that on average, people in Kuala Lumpur spend 25 minutes every day searching for parking. That’s a total of 6.3 continuous days of search for parking!
Source: Straits Times
This puts us in the third spot, on par with Hong Kong, on the list among other major Southeast Asian cities. Meanwhile our neighbours down south in Singapore spends an average of 19 minutes daily but I guess we are already considered lucky as Hanoi nabs the top spot at 45 minutes.
The study, commissioned by ride-sharing platform Uber, looks at the impact of ridesharing in Southeast Asia and the various benefits it brings such as reducing the need for parking. BCG found that Kuala Lumpur has recently upgraded the public transport system to cover more areas, yet people prefer to use other modes of transport.
Source: The Star
Hence, the more cars there are on the road, the harder it will be to find parking, which reduces our productivity and makes us late for important appointments.
It’s actually getting quite serious because the study shows that even though we fully utilise the capacity of the current and future rail lines, Kuala Lumpur could be unable to maintain the current levels of congestion by 2022. A similar problem is faced by Bangkok as both cities are placed in Tier 2.
Source: Unlocking Cities
Time to hop on that public transport, I guess?
Also read: Malaysian Shares Frustrating Experience of Ignorant Man “Human Parking” in 1 Utama
