Ampang Park explanation

 Lau Wei Yiang

Lawrence Kong here's the explanation from what I know; feel free to clarify certain areas if I am inaccurate.

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The Ampang Park shopping center was acquired to build the Ampang Park MRT station. Under the plans, the LRT station at Ampang Park would have a seamless, paid link between the MRT station and the LRT station, making it convenient for passengers to transfer between the Putrajaya Line and Kelana Jaya Line. The link was to consist of one large linkway to bring people down a flight of stairs and escalators from the LRT to the MRT. However, because of the significance and historical context of Ampang Park as the first shopping complex in Malaysia, many shop owners protested the acquisition when it was made in 2016.

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The MRT Corp subsequently met with the owners of Ampang Park and promised to keep the shopping complex. However, the MRT Corp officials were insistent of a paid link to connect the MRT and LRT station together to avoid complications like what we see now. The MRT station, in the original blueprints, was not constructed on the site of the shopping mall. The shopping mall was acquired to build the linkway because the MRT officials were concerned that building an underground tunnel would destabilize the shopping mall as the mall sits on outdated, weak foundations built using outdated technology; if I am not mistaken, the mall sits on concrete plates rather than concrete piles. Therefore, MRT Corp explained the decision to acquire the mall; they had originally no intention to demolish it but had to acquire it for fears the mall would collapse. Constructing a large, underground linkway was complex and the large excavation would potentially destabilize the mall, as the mall sits between the LRT and MRT station.

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The MRT Corp held a townhall meeting with the shopowners of Ampang Park. The MRT Corp proposed a partial acquisition of the mall in which the mall's foundations would be strengthened, and a narrow underground linkway be built on the site, using a mined method to prevent disruptions while still keeping the mall. This would still affect some shopowners, say around 10 shopowners instead of the over 200 shops there. However, those shopowners refused to agree; MRT Corp insisted that either everyone agree or the original option be reinstated and the mall demolished. In the end, many shopowners protested, leading to MRT Corp fully acquiring Ampang Park after the court order.

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After the 2018 General Election, the Finance Ministry and the Ministry of Transport terminated the contract of MMC Gamuda, the contractor for the underground section of the line, and reopened the contract for bidding in order to reduce costs as part of Pakatan Harapan's manifesto. This resulted in protests from the workers and engineers of MMC Gamuda. The government subsequently reinstated MMC Gamuda as the contractor, and a deal was signed to reduce costs for the project. The reduction in costs resulted in the elimination of a ceiling board for elevated MRT stations, the changing of glass panels on stairwells to grated grill panels, the modification of the train's color scheme and the scrapping of unnecessary entrances and constructions for the project. As part of the cost reduction schemes, the underground seamless paid linkway was cancelled.

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The good news is that there are still provisions at the site for a paid-to-paid link between the two stations when the time became suitable to build it, so no worries!