Johor wants transit project to ease '4th most congested city' in M'sia

The Johor state government has proposed that the Automated Rapid Transit (ART) project be implemented on important alignments first if it receives approval from the federal government.

State executive councillor Fazli Salleh said alignments such as in the Tebrau area, which often experiences traffic congestion, should be given priority.

He said this is to ensure the ART project is expedited to disperse traffic in the affected areas, alongside the Johor Bahru-Singapore Rapid Transit System (RTS) Link project next year.

“The Tebrau area is the most congested. We can probably prioritise this alignment first and then focus on other alignments.

“For example, if the alignment involves a route of about 20km, we can do it as a package and contractors can work together to speed up construction,” he told Bernama when interviewed at his office in Kota Iskandar recently.

Fazli said the state government initially proposed three alignments to the Transport Ministry.

They would specifically include Skudai and Iskandar Puteri, while a new alignment in Pasir Gudang had not been raised with the ministry so far.

According to him, the state government waited about a year to get approval for the project, even though a study had been done considering that its implementation cost was lower than the Light Rail Transit (LRT) Project.

“At that time, apart from looking at the lower construction cost, the construction time may also be shorter than the LRT, thus speeding up the related process,” he said.

Exco rues ‘late’ approval

In this regard, he reiterated his hope that the federal government would immediately approve the project, thus supporting the operation of RTS Link.

The delay in implementation, he said, is expected to cause the city to experience congestion for the next few years.

“Whether or not this ART has to be done, let’s just say we are late in receiving approval, so we will have several years of Johor Bahru being congested. Besides, there is a study of Johor Bahru being the fourth most congested in Malaysia,” he said.

Previously, Fazli reportedly said that the estimated cost of providing LRT infrastructure in Johor was RM16.7 billion, compared to the ART, which only involved about RM7 billion.

Last December, Transport Minister Anthony Loke was quoted as saying that the ART project approval was under discussion and implementation details would be finalised in the near future.

Loke said Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and Johor Menteri Besar Onn Hafiz Ghazi also held discussions on the matter.

The Regent of Johor, Tunku Mahkota Ismail, also expressed concern over the traffic congestion that will arise when the RTS Link is operational, and the ART project has not yet been implemented.

- Bernama

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