Najib visits TRX MRT station construction site

Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak today visited the construction site of the Tun Razak Exchange (TRX) Mass Rapid Transport (MRT) station to see for himself the progress on the most modern public transport hub in the country, which is scheduled for completion in July 2017.

The Prime Minister arrived at the site located at Jalan Tun Razak here at 4.40pm and was welcomed by MRT Corporation Sdn Bhd chairman Tan Sri Dr Ali Hamsa, who is also the Chief Secretary to the Government.

Also present were Deputy Finance Minister, Datuk Ahmad Maslan, MRT Corp chief executive officer Datuk Seri Shahril Mokhtar and Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD) chairman Tan Sri Syed Hamid Albar.

Immediately after donning a safety helmet, safety jacket and safety boots, Najib was given a briefing on the status of the project by MRT Corp's Sungai Buloh-Kajang (SBK) Route project manager Marcus Karakashian where he was updated that it (TRX MRT station) was 60 per cent completed.

The Prime Minister was then taken on a walkabout at the site including up the viewing deck, station platform and commuter tunnels and was seen nodding his head and smiling several times as he was briefed en route to the locations before leaving the site at 5.30pm.

This is the third time Najib is visiting MRT project sites. He visited the Cochrane MRT station site twice last year,

The TRX MRT station is biggest among the seven underground MRT stations along the SBK route which will later be extended to Serdang and Putrajaya (MRT Two Route).

The SBK Route, being built under the first phase of the MRT Project, covers a distance of 51 kilometres with 31 stations and can accomodate 1.2 million commuters.

Meanwhile in a statement today, MRT Corp Tunneling Project Director Satpal S Bhogal said the overall completion of the underground works was at 75 per cent with tunneling works at 95 per cent as of January this year.

He added that the tunneling works for the entire SBK line is expected to be completed by the first week of next month.

According to Satpal, the station works were also progressing well at all seven MRT underground stations with 63 per cent completion at Maluri station followed by 62 per cent at Muzium Negara station, Pasar Seni station (61 per cent), Merdeka station (56 per cent), TRX station (58 per cent) and Bukit Bintang (48 per cent).

"With the achievements to date and heavy investment in manpower and machinery for tunneling works, we are confident that we will be in time for the opening of the second phase of SBK Line in July 2017.

"..and now we are able to assemble a full team of experts for tunneling jobs locally. Our dependence on foreign experts and skilled workers will be reduced significantly.

"There will be a time in the near future that we will be fully self-sufficient to undertake tunneling jobs, in line with our vision of reaching a high-income nation status," said Satpal.