Highways not answer to internal city congestion, town planners say

SHAH ALAM, June 27 — Building highways within city limits to bypass the congestion on the inner roads is not a viable solution to traffic woes, urban planning experts said today as Selangor mulls mowing down four green lungs to make way for a 38-km expressway on its eastern flank.

The long-term solution should focus on improving the public transportation system and connecting roads, representatives from the Malaysian Institute of Planners (MIP) said, adding their objection to the degazettement of the four forest reserves in Selangor that are vital water catchment zones for the Klang Valley.

“If we spend the money to improve the local connectivity, make good the junctions, the connections, within local areas, there is no need for highways.

“More money should be poured into the public transportation system,” MIP council member Datin Noraida Saludin said after her submission at the Selangor state secretariat building.

She added that highways are meant to connect rural areas to major cities, and not within a city itself.

The loss of the forest reserves that currently stand on the proposed East Klang Valley Expressway (EKVE) might disrupt more than just traffic, with water supply potentially the biggest urban issue in future, another town planner Khairiah Mohd Talha warned, should the Pakatan Rakyat state government move ahead to degazette the forest reserves for the highway.

“There will be disruption of water supply. We have calculated that this area provides 19 million litres of portable water per day to 9,225 households in the Ampang area,” she said.

The former MIP council member added that the corridor will affect the Ampang intake plant as well as the Klang Gates Dam, which supplies to 80,000 households and business premises in the Klang Valley.

“You cut through this, you are cutting through rivers and tributaries that supply water to these dams.

“We already have a water supply shortage,” Khairiah said.

The state is proposing to degazette portions of the Ampang, Bukit Seputeh, Ulu Gombak and Ulu Langat forest reserves, which is part of the Selangor State Park.

Khairiah said the National Physical Plan (NPP), which was endorsed by the prime minister, categorised the state park as an environmentally-sensitive area that precluded projects such as the proposed highway.

“This means that the area is strictly protected and no development shall be allowed under the NPP except for low impact tourism and research or education facilities,” she said.

Aside from the loss of greenery, the project could threaten surrounding rivers through increased siltation, she added.

Khairiah also said that the project, if approved, would also open up hill slopes that were 20 degrees steep to urban development.

Bukit Lanjan assemblyman Elizabeth Wong, who chaired the panel for the public hearing yesterday and today, said only 300 of the 700 letters protesting the degazettement were properly addressed and from residents in the  Gombak and Ulu Langat districts.

Invitation letters were sent to the 300 but only about 30 people responded and attended the hearing, which was closed to the public and the media.

But Wong gave her assurance that the letters received from those who did not attend the hearing would also be taken into consideration.

She added a report would be presented next month to the Selangor Economic Action Council (MTES), which will then make the final decision.

The panel for the two-day public hearing include Wong, Dr Ahmad Yunus Hairi, also a state executive councillor, representatives from Forest Research Institute Malaysia (FRIM), Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia’s Institute for Environment and Development (Lestari UKM), the Selangor Water Management Authority (Luas), the Department of Irrigation and Drainage (DID), Public Works Department (JKR), the Department of Environment (DOE), and the Forestry Department.

The EKVE forms the final section of the KL Outer Ring Road (KLORR) that currently comprises the LATAR Highway, Guthrie Corridor Expressway, ELITE Highway, South Klang Valley Expressway and SILK Expressway.

Construction is expected to begin next year.