KL steps up bid to ease traffic jams

KL steps up bid to ease traffic jams

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP): Malaysia has intensified its bid to
encourage car-pooling with new advertisements which suggest ugly
mobile urinals would hit the roads unless motorists in traffic-
choked Kuala Lumpur comply with the campaign, a report said
yesterday.

"The advertisements suggest that this unsightly objects might
become necessary as traffic jams get worse," the New Straits
Times daily said as authorities launched a new bid to get
Malaysian drivers to car-pool after a failed attempt in 1993.

Commercials warning of the "consequences of refusing to share
vehicles" were made by the advertising agency DDB Needham and
will cost the government a further 2.7 million ringgit (US$1.08
million) after the 9.7 million ringgit spent on the campaign in
the last two years.

Spurred by a booming economy, vehicle ownership in the
Malaysian capital has been growing at an annual rate of 20
percent, with some half a million cars, 300,000 motorcycles and
20,000 buses and taxis entering the city daily, officials said.

Kuala Lumpur is ranked third after Bangkok and Jakarta -- two
of Asia's most traffic-congested cities -- in terms of vehicle
numbers.