Cover Story: Focusing on being ‘green’, ‘connected’ and ‘inclusive’
The Kwasa Land Sdn Bhd office occupies part of the former Malaysian Natural Rubber Museum, a quaint, colonial-era building with brick-lined roads and parking bays, as well as a 100-year-old tree in its compound. Established in 2010, Kwasa Land is a unit of the Employees Provident Fund (EPF) and the master developer of the 2,620-acre Kwasa Damansara township.
Located on land previously owned by the Rubber Research Institute, the development is surrounded by mature townships and landmarks such as Subang Bestari, Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport (Subang Airport), Kota Damansara, Sungai Buloh and Tropicana Golf & Country Resort.
Kwasa Land finalised the purchase of the site for RM2.28 billion in 2012, according to news reports. The tract’s accessibility and connectivity have since been enhanced with the completion of the Kwasa Sentral and Kwasa Damansara MRT stations. Meanwhile, the Damansara-Shah Alam Elevated Expressway (DASH) has an interchange exit there.
While there had been the occasional news about Kwasa Damansara thereafter, no significant developments were reported — that is, until the EPF’s new headquarters, the Green Building Index Platinum-rated Menara KWSP, was completed in June last year.
The launch of the two 12-storey office blocks will be officiated by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim next month. The buildings occupy almost six acres out of the total 30 acres set aside for the EPF.
Kwasa Land managing director Datuk Adenan Md Yusof, in an exclusive interview with City & Country, says the township falls within the purview of both the Shah Alam City Council (MBSA) and Petaling Jaya City Council (MBPJ). The total acquired land area stands at 2,620 acres, of which 1,354 acres are freehold and the rest leasehold.
Of the 2,620 acres, some 361 acres were acquired by the government for the construction of the MRT stations and DASH, as well as for the use of the meteorology department. Some 935 acres, or about 40% of the 2,259 acres left, were surrendered to the government for infrastructure works and public facilities. That left 1,324 acres for developments in Kwasa Damansara, with 345 acres under the MBSA and 979 acres under the MBPJ.
Land sale strategy
According to Adenan, the estimated gross development value of Kwasa Damansara is RM50 billion to RM60 billion. The township will see more activity by the middle of this year when developers start launching their projects, he says.
He adds that, like other township developments, Kwasa Damansara aims to come up with solutions to the issue of urbanisation while providing good access to highways, healthcare, schools, public amenities and so on.
“In Kwasa Damansara, we exceed those expectations [for public amenities]. We provide about 260 acres of green and recreational areas. We have allocated 15 plots for schools, one hospital plot and one plot for an international school. These are important for our developers to market their products,” says Adenan.
“We have sold about 49% of the land to nine partners [so far] … We have a master plan that they have to follow, [as] we have allocated the density of each plot, and they have complied with the requirements under the master plan approval. At the same time, we have given them guidelines on how they should build their developments [based on the quality we want]. The guidelines are what we call the urban design guidelines, and we want to impose on them in terms of how to build the road, drainage and so on.”
Adenan says Kwasa Land was very aggressive in securing partners last year through tendering exercises. Its strategy is to sell all leasehold lands and hold on to the freehold lands, as the former carries a higher cost. The master developer plans to look into the various possibilities for the freehold portions — whether to develop them by itself or with other developers — at a later date.
“So far, we have been successful in getting the partners we want. We have 51% left and we are
going to do more tendering exercises and, hopefully, we can identify a few more developers to complete our strategic direction in terms of selling the lands to developers. Our target is to sell 200 to 250 acres a year,” he adds.
“The main reason is all about investment … We spent a lot of money on infrastructure and land acquisition. This is EPF money and we need to provide a return to the EPF, so we need to expedite our sales in order to [provide the returns],” says Adenan.
As the landowner, Kwasa Land expects its partners to develop quality products that are in line with the market’s demands. The completion of Kwasa Damansara will take about 20 to 25 years from now.
Development concepts
Kwasa Land’s vision is to make Kwasa Damansara a distinctive, sustainable next-generation city and one of the greenest townships in the Klang Valley through its development concepts of “green”, “connected” and “inclusive”.
The aim of “green” is to develop Kwasa Damansara into a low-carbon city. With a total of nine parks planned, there will be 261 acres of green and open spaces there. As for “connected”, while the area is easily accessible via the two MRT stations and DASH, Kwasa Land has completed part of a new link — Persiaran Atmosfera — to connect the township to Shah Alam, with another 1km to 1.5km to be built, says Adenan.
To make Kwasa Damansara an “inclusive” township, a strategic mix of development components has been planned, with 10,722 of the total 25,799 housing units to be affordable housing. Upon its completion, the area is expected to serve 200,000 residents and provide 100,000 employment opportunities.
According to Adenan, the initial master plan had 61 million sq ft of commercial space, including hotels, offices, malls, retail units and serviced apartments. However, Kwasa Land has decided to revise the percentage of commercial space owing to changes in consumer behaviour post-pandemic, he says.
In the initial master plan, some 70% of the MBSA side and 30% of the MBPJ side had been earmarked for commercial developments. Now, though, Adenan sees less demand for office and retail spaces, so the developer is changing the ratio because “developments have to be market-driven”.
“You have to develop based on what the market can absorb, [and] the best component to do now is residential developments. We will convert some of the commercial components into residential. There will be a lot more exciting stuff coming up and we will have more exciting announcements and initiatives,” he explains.
“We hope our partners will expedite their developments and most of them will launch their projects by the second quarter of this year. We are also hoping to get more partners this year. And very soon, we are going to launch affordable housing projects here, and the first 4,000 units under Rumah Idaman Rakyat Selangor will be launched in June.”
Development plans
The 4,000 units will be developed by Gagasan Nadi Cergas Bhd, says Adenan. These freehold units, with built-ups of 1,000 sq ft, will be priced from RM250,000 to RM300,000 and come with kitchen cabinets and air conditioners in all the rooms. “Each unit will have two parking bays. [There is] a subsidy on the land price as we had sold the land at a lower price.”
Other partner developers at Kwasa Damansara include MRCB Land Sdn Bhd, Gadang Holdings Bhd, TSR Capital Bhd, YTL Corp Bhd, Impiana Land & Development Sdn Bhd and Exsim Group (see map on Page 5 for more information on the projects).
While the developments by these partners are all in the Shah Alam side, Kwasa Land has identified a partner for a 400-acre tract — dubbed PJ East — on the Petaling Jaya side and they are in the final stage of completing the agreement.
At the same time, there will be more developments within the EPF tract. A retail hub with a gross floor area of 63,500 sq ft and a net lettable area of 39,000 sq ft, will be constructed on a 3.25-acre parcel next to Menara KWSP.
Adenan says the construction of this retail hub will start in June. Upon completion, it will have a supermarket (14,700 sq ft), 20 retail units and two drive-thru F&B outlets to cater to the working population nearby.
“We have also completed a park called Taman Bandar on the Shah Alam side but we have yet to open it to the public as we don’t have other developments to support it. It is 13 acres and we want to bring in the population first before we open it. Then, we have also completed 80% of the infrastructure works on the Shah Alam side and we will start the infrastructure works in Petaling Jaya next year,” he adds.
As one of the last large tracts in the Klang Valley with new developments to be launched soon, all eyes are on the Kwasa Damansara township.
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