In less than a month, it will be my fifth anniversary working in Cyberjaya or CBJ in short. For the past two days, I’ve been commuting to my new office in Jalan Semantan, Damansara and that made me miss CBJ even more. Why did I miss the jungle of CBJ so much?

Working in CBJ means, in a worst case scenario, I get to wake up half an hour before I start work. Fifteen minutes to get ready and fifteen minutes to get to work at 120-140km/h. No traffic jam unless there’s an accident. The distance between home and office is only approx. 25km and there’s only one toll which costs me RM1.60 single way. I have been enjoying the stress free drive to office for the past five years.

Working in CBJ also means that I don’t have to worry about not getting a parking space. There’s ample space to park my car. I usually arrive before 9am which means, if I can’t find a place in basement 1, the basement 2 is still empty. There’s also additional space at the nearby CIMB building or the Arena sports area but some people are still ignoring the law by parking at the roadside because they are lazy to walk a bit further.

Two days in Damansara, it was such a nightmare that I resolute to appreciate working in CBJ! I have almost forgotten the misery of driving in massive traffic since I moved out of Sunway in 2003 and now, I’m back into the game. On the first day, I left home at half past seven. It took me an hour and a half to reach the office. There were three stages of traffic jams. The first and the worst was at Sunway toll where the queue had build up from IOI mall until the toll plaza. The next jam trap were at Kelana Jaya and Pusat Bandar Damansara. On the second day, it was quite good. I departed at 7.15am and when I reached Sunway toll, the traffic was building up but it took me only fifteen minutes. Traffic was crawling rather than bumper-to-bumper. The whole journey was forty-five minutes. Not bad.

Now, comes to the killing part. Parking at the office could not cater to the increasing number of staff. My application is #200 on the waiting list. Walauwei! I’ve to wait for 200 people ahead of me either to retire or resign or die (god bless their souls) in order to get my parking lot. There are public carparks at the surrounding areas but the rate is really cut-throat i.e. between RM2 to RM3/hour. Can you imagine on the first day, I spent RM18 on parking???

And on the second day, because I had late telecons, my parking rate roared to RM22. That’s only parking. For toll charges, if I take LDP it costs me RM3.20 for return trip. However, in the evening, I’d avoid LDP and use alternative route. On the first day, I went home via Philleo > NKVE > Subang > Federal Highway (exit at USJ 18)> Puchong route. On the second day, I experimented another route i.e. Jln Semantan > en route Segambut > Penchala > LDP > NKVE > Elite > USJ (Hicom) > Puchong. The latter route was quicker but costly.

Next week I’m gonna explore the Jln Semantan > Bangsar > Mid-Valley > KL - Putrajaya highway > Bkt Jalil > Puchong. Then, on the second day next week I’m gonna compare Jln Semantan > Bangsar > Old Klang > Puchong route. If you notice, my return route is all avoiding the Sunway toll again because in the evening, the traffic checkmate at Sunway toll all the way to IOI mall.

In a day, my daily expenses for parking and toll is averaged at RM30. Add in fuel and meal, that’s close to RM50 per day. Multiply by 5 days. Repeat that for 4 weeks. You do the math for monthly expenses. Even a five figure, would be exhausted. Spoke to my new boss and he doesn’t mind I work more days at home eventually as long as I deliver results. However, during this initial stage my presence in the office is preferred so I could interact and meet with people.

How to solve my problem? I’ve thought of alternatives ranked by preference of practicality:

1. Apply for a season pass from one of the nearby parking operators. However, they don’t come cheap and currently, demand outweighs supply. I would be lucky to get one.
2. Get an easyrider or a superbike. Back to my old riding days but there’s also HSSE concerns.
3. Park my car somewhere nearby, e.g. Bangsar Shopping Center radius and take a taxi.
4. Leave my car at Kelana Jaya or Putrajaya station and take the train to KL Sentral. Take the company bus from there.

Time to think weighted score method to help make a decision. Oh, how much I have missed CBJ!!! Should I make a u-turn and join the other company?

 Email This Post . This entry was posted on Thursday, May 22nd, 2008 at 12:31 am and is filed under Life Documentary, Travel & Adventure. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.