Drilling started in Kuala Lumpur
BAM’s German operating company, Wayss & Freytag Ingenieurbau, has started drilling work on the almost ten-kilometre-long SMART Tunnel in Kuala Lumpur. SMART stands for ‘Stormwater Management and Road Tunnel’ and is set to fulfil a double function.
During tropical rainstorms – which currently lead to floods occurring in the city once or twice a year – the rainwater will be transported by the tunnel to a catchment basin. Outside these times, traffic will move across a length of 2.4 kilometres through the tunnel tube by means of two stacked carriageways. With an external diameter in excess of thirteen metres, this is the largest tunnel ever drilled in Southeast Asia. BAM’s operating company is handling 5.4 kilometres of the tunnel, of which 700 metres has a double function. The operation involves an amount of 83 million euros. The Malaysian building consortium MMC/Gamuda, the main contractor for the whole project, will handle the remaining tunnel section. The work will be finished in June 2006.