The History

The flooding problem in Kuala Lumpur City Centre has become more frequent and serious in recent years. Within the last decade, 6 major floods occurred i.e. on 30 April 2000, 26 April 2001, 29 October 2001, 11 June 2002, 10 June 2003 and 10 June 2007. These floods resulted in high property damages, loss of lifes, disruption in traffic, hampering socio-economic activities, and adversely affecting the image of Kuala Lumpur as the Capital City of Malaysia.

Causes of floods :

· Rapid and uncontrolled development in catchment areas.

· Obstructions in river flow system that reduce flow capacity

· Limited available flood flow due to escalating urbanization process.

Consequently, because the development in catchment areas of Klang river far exceed the projection during the early planning stages of flood mitigation program, the existing capacity of Klang River in the city centre is therefore unable to cater for the excess flood flow. Taking into consideration of the obstructions and constrictions in the river and based on study (year 2001), the government decided to construct a dual-function flood bypass cum traffic dispersion tunnel coupled with flood detention ponds to mitigate the flooding problem in Kuala Lumpur City Centre. SMART is an important and integral part of the overall Kuala Lumpur Flood Mitigation System.