New MRT ride

Since I go around town on my motorbike, taking public transportation anywhere rarely crosses my mind. However since they have just finished building the second mass rapid transit (MRT) line from Kajang to Sungai Buloh, I thought why not bring my family for a ride. They’re even offering half price tickets for the ride, not just the MRT but the entire Rapid KL fleet. Our place is around 15 minutes each to Kajang and Bandar Tun Hussein Onn - the two closest MRT stations to us. I ultimately decided to go and park near Bandar Tun Hussein Onn on the assumption that it has more parking spots than the former and it does. Well at least they were one or two empty parking spots left when we got there. I can imagine the place will get filled up pretty quickly during weekdays.

Like any other new things, this MRT station was shiny and new. Kids below 12 don’t have to pay anything so I just paid for my wife and I. The train was punctual and fast with 15 minutes interval between them. The interior of the coach is much more spacious too, pretty impressive compared to the old LRT line. Despite the considerable distance between Bandar Tun Hussein Onn and our destination station at Mutiara Damansara, I felt the entire ride was pretty quick. The Mutiara Damansara station exits at Surian Tower although there is in fact another station next door called Surian which I’m guess is just a few steps away. From Surian Tower we need to walk to eCurve which is connected to The Curve and then IKEA or Tesco. Naturally we went to IKEA for our monthly pilgrimage (and lunch).

Overall I feel that the new MRT line is a major improvement to the previous two LRT lines and also KTM Komuter. If I want to go shopping or sight-seeing at Mutiara Damansara, I could just drop by the nearest MRT station and get there within half an hour. Or if I feel like having satay in Kajang, the train goes the other twice as fast. That said, although only 15 minutes on a clear traffic day from our home, the MRT stations are still 20 kilometers away from here. It makes much more sense to go to the Bukit Jalil LRT station which is only 8.4 KM from here. And also all things like cost and time considered, it is much cheaper and faster to use the car to go to say Mutiara Damansara or Kajang. For people living near MRT stations maybe its favorable to use the system, otherwise I’d take the car.