The project was mooted during former prime minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi’s time in 2007 and was plagued with “land acquisition issues”. Construction only began in 2015.
The hub’s builders, Malaysian Resources Corp Bhd (MRCB), gave a briefing on the RM230 million terminus to Penang Chief Minister Chow Kon Yeow today.
The nine-storey terminal, covering 290,000 sq ft, is integrated with the Butterworth KTMB station, the RapidFerry terminal, the express bus services and local intercity bus services.
It will feature 38 express bus bays, manual ticketing bays and electronic ticketing kiosks.
There will be 577 car park bays with 80 bays for registered taxi drivers and a waiting area for e-hailing drivers outside the building.
Officials said Penang Sentral would serve an average of 3,000 to 4,000 passengers daily, with the bulk of it from express bus passengers.
In future, the surrounding land will be developed to include a shopping mall, an office tower and a hotel/service apartment project, with expected completion by 2023 to 2025.
The development will take place on 9.2ha fronting the North Channel.
The overall gross development value (GDV) of the seven-phase project, including the Penang Sentral, is estimated to be RM2.8 billion.
It is expected to turn Butterworth into a modern city with numerous economic spin-offs. Real estate value in the vicinity is expected to go up once the project is completed.
Catamaran and cable car services
Chow also revealed that Penang Sentral would be the future terminal for the state’s proposed catamaran service.
He said the catamaran service, to complement the existing ferry service, will be proposed by the Penang government at next week’s National Transport Council meeting in Putrajaya.
Chow said the catamaran would run at frequent intervals and match the demand of the KTMB Electric Train Service (ETS) to Kuala Lumpur.
“Ultimately, we hope the federal government would quickly revamp the cross-sea transport services by introducing the catamaran service and improving the frequency of the ferry service as well,” he said.
Chow also lauded the Penang Sentral’s opening, saying it was “a big step forward” in the country’s transport system as it moves into a more transit-oriented development.
He said the idea of having such a large terminal was to ensure passengers had easy seamless connectivity between different modes of transport.
On a different note, Chow said MRCB’s plan to build a 3km George Town-Butterworth cable car project, dubbed the “Sky Cab” will go on, with MRCB fine-tuning its plan to adjust the “landing point” station on the mainland.
“The alignment towards George Town needs slight changes. Several locations for a station on the island side have been proposed. One is at the ferry terminal itself,” he said.
The Sky Cab link is expected to cater to 1,000 passengers per hour, per direction.
It is a joint venture between the Penang government and MRCB with the cost reported in 2015 to be around RM250 million to RM300 million.