The project is expected to cost up to RM9 billion.
“The Ministry of Finance has given approval for the appointment of the joint venture (JV) between MRCB and George Kent as the PDP for LRT3,” Prasarana chairman Tan Sri Ismail Adam told a news conference today.
“The appointment of the PDP was done through an open tender process. The companies went through the standard procurement stages and it was approved by the government,” he said after announcing the partnership at Prasarana head office in Bangsar.
It was reported that six JVs and individual companies were in the running for the urban rail project. Besides MRCB and George Kent, the companies that were shortlisted are:
- Gamuda Bhd and MMC Corp Bhd,
- UEM Group Bhd,
- Sunway Bhd,
- Naza Group and China-based partner CSR Zhuzhou Electric Locomotive Co Ltd, and
- WCT Bhd and AlloyMTD Group.
Construction work on the 36km LRT3 or Bandar Utama-Klang Line will begin in the first quarter of 2016 and is expected to be completed by 31 August 2020.
Prasarana managing director Datuk Azmi Abdul Aziz said Prasarana will finance the project via the issuance of sukuk, of which the coupon rate would be decided later. Local institutions have shown interest on the financing for the project through its sukuk issuance.
The RM9 billion estimate does not include the cost of land acquisition, which will only be revealed only after Prasarana had confirmed the number of packages of land they will acquire for the LRT3 construction.
“There will be additional cost for the land acquisitions. We are still listening to grouses on the ground to minimise the social impact,” he said.
“The appointment of MRCB as PDP is to start the design work immediately, in order to establish and confirm for our approval of the technical design characteristics and to be able to work towards the pre-qualifications of the contractors to be invited to participate.”
Normally a PDP represents an entity that possesses significant amount of project and construction expertise that will assume the project delivery risk from the project owner after the project has been competitively tendered.
With the PDP strategy, the project owner enjoys the best of both worlds where the mega project is divided into multiple packages for competitive bidding to ensure maximum spread, while reducing risk of cost overrun and late completion – borne by the PDP.
The main concept of PDP is that the PDP assumes complete risk ownership and accountability for project deliver, from conceptualisation untill the date of completion, including specifications to cost, time and quality by integrating all contractors (civil, infrastructure and systems) involved.
Prasarana had earlier organised public inspection on the LRT3 alignment for a period of 3 months from May 15.
Azmi said that 90% of the stakeholders support the LRT3 project based on the public hearing exercise which was carried out over a period of three months and ended on August 14.
“Only 10% are not keen on the project and we are constantly engaging with them. We will look into their proposals and expect to finalise the alignment by year end,” he said, adding that the final alignment would be approved by the Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD).
Currently, the proposed alignment of LRT3 begins from Bandar Utama to Johan Setia in Klang and the approval-in-principle was announced during Budget 2015. The acquisition of land will begin concurrently.
According to CIMB Research, the award would translate into RM19 million to RM25 million net profit for MRCB in financial year 2016 and 2017 respectively, and this will progressively grow higher towards the project’s completion in 2020.
However, the downside risks to the 6% PDP fees are cost overruns, variation orders and delays. Hence, the next tender phase for the seven civil work packages are most crucial.
The new line would begin from the Bandar Utama MRT Station and head towards Merchant Square in Tropicana before cutting across the NKVE to interchange at Glenmarie LRT Station.
The line continues to Hicom-Glenmarie Industrial Park, heading for Shah Alam via Section 13 near the Shah Alam Stadium, then towards Universiti Teknologi Mara (UITM) in Section 2 and i-City in Section 7.
The train will then travel down Bukit Raja to the Klang KTM Komuter station via Jalan Meru before heading further south for Bandar Bukit Tinggi and finally ending in Johan Setia.
Based on studies done by Prasarana, it is estimated that 450,000 workers and 50,000 tertiary students live along the LRT3 corridor. The population catchment of the alignment corridor is expected to be in excess of 2 million people.
The expected ridership will be 70,000 per day when completed. The travel time between end-to-end stations will be 51 minutes. LRT3 will be the first urban rail project in Malaysia that use green technology applications.
There will be 10 park-and-ride stations offering 5,000 parking bays and a total of five (5) integrated stations, which would connect the following services:
- MRT SBK Line/MRT Line 1,
- LRT Kelana Jaya Line,
- Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) Kuala Lumpur-Klang, and
- KTM Komuter.
The LRT3 will be fully elevated except for a 2km underground section including an underground station on Persiaran Hishamuddin in Shah Alam. The LRT train depot will be built at Johan Setia.
The rolling stock, similar to those used in the LRT Kelana Jaya Line, will be used. The train can be configured to a 2, 4 or 6 car-vehicle train. In total, there will be 25 stations along the 36km route. The following is a list of the planned stations:
1. Bandar Utama (Interchange with MRT SBK Line/MRT Line 1)
2. Damansara Utama
3. Tropicana
4. Lien Hoe
5. Dataran Prima
6. Persada PLUS
7. Station 3/Glenmarie (Interchange with LRT Kelana Jaya Line Extension)
8. Temasya
9. Hicom-Glenmarie
10. Stadium (Interchange with the proposed BRT Kuala Lumpur-Klang)
11. Persiaran Hishamuddin (Underground Station)
12. Section 14
13. SIRIM (Interchange with the proposed BRT Kuala Lumpur-Klang)
14. UITM
15. i-City
16. Bukit Raja
17. Kawasan 17
18. Jalan Meru
19. Klang (Interchange with KTM Komuter Batu Caves-Pelabuhan Klang)
20. Taman Selatan
21. Sri Andalas
22. Tesco Bukit Tinggi
23. AEON Bukit Tinggi
24. Bandar Botanik
25. Johan Setia (Depot)