Malsingmaps Forum

Had an interesting visit to Johor yesterday. Malsingmaps were invited to have a sneak preview and track the soon to be opened Senai Desaru extension to Penawar. Our PM will officiate its official opening sometime at the end of the month.

With this new extension, travel time to Desaru and Tg Balau is cut significantly .. by at least 45 mins travel time by my estimates. No more messy Kota Tinggi road! It would also mean a direct route for Singaporeans to travel from Second Link.

The new segment is actually a single carriageway, dual direction with room for expansion. So users may be surprised that it is a tolled highway but it doesn't look like one The idea is that once traffic volume hits a certain threshold, the Concessionaires will build a dual carriageway.

The route is very scenic, passing by prawn farms and the water catchment area for Johor. Interestingly enough, this highway has a first-in-Malaysia feature of having a special drainage for chemical run-off in the event of accidents involving toxic chemicals or contents. This is to prevent it from leaching into the ground and affecting the water catchment.

The highlight must be the as-yet-unnamed bridge. It is a single plane cable stay bridge comprising of both composite and concrete decks. It is the longest bridge over a river in Peninsular @ 1.8kms and its midspan is actually double the length of Penang Bridge. Very nice.

With the opening of this bridge (after 4 years of delay!), I suspect Desaru and its surrounds will get a huge kick in visitors.

Wait for the official opening! Will appear in MSM NT 5.12.

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Bridge over Sungai Johor


Desaru public beach


Tg Balau public beach

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Malsingmaps is now an official partner of Garmin to produce maps for MY, SG & Brunei.

The cleanliness of Tg Balau beach could be improved though. They should take a leaf from places like Kuta in Bali, where teams are mobilised to clean the beaches at night away from prying eyes. All the tourists will see during the day are just clean pristine beaches.

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Malsingmaps is now an official partner of Garmin to produce maps for MY, SG & Brunei.

Finally! This bridge has been talked about for so long. It's great to see its fruition. It won't be long before we will see a 3rd link to Singapore.

Thanks for the pics, Adil.

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Citius Altius Fortius

4 years to be exact!

The new extension brings the length of Senai Desaru Expressway (SDE) to 68kms in total. The new extension adds 25kms if I am not mistaken. But I wouldn't take it at night though .. no streetlighting as far as I can tell. But the segment after the highway to Tg Balau is lighted.

Semi-D house in sleepy hollow that is Penawar is going for RM400k. Wow. Talk about high property prices out in the boondocks!

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Malsingmaps is now an official partner of Garmin to produce maps for MY, SG & Brunei.

Anyone can verify / confirm that the entire stretch has been completed and operational ?

Hi,

Use the expressway last week, and it ends at Cahaya Baru.

Received the following message on 19 April 2011:

Dear Mike,

Thank you for your question. For your information sir, we are still waiting
for the approval of Package-3 opening (Cahaya Baru - Desaru) from Malaysian
Highway Authority. Until then, we can't give the exact date when Package-3
is usable to the public. Thank you.

E22TMC

Try reading this.

anyone tested out the new highway already? Anything to take note?

Btw is it on the latest map download?

Good news, it's open on 10 June 2011.

According to the website, http://www.e22.com.my

"E22 has been fully completed and opened to public starting from 10 June 2011. The final stretch from Cahaya Baru to Desaru is approximately 27 km in length which includes the Single Plane Cable-Stayed Bridge across Sg Johor that ends at the Penawar Interchange..........."

Bro extremme, read the first post of this thread, last line