The Melaka government is planning to build and undersea tunnel that will connect the state to Kota Dumai in Sumatra, Indonesia. The announcement was made by the state’s chief minister Sulaiman Md Ali during the launch of the Melaka Week at the ongoing Expo 2020 in Dubai.

The undersea tunnel will cut down the travel distance between Melaka and Kota Dumai to about 47km. It’s not a particularly long distance if you are driving, and it will definitely make traveling between the two places a lot easier.

Majlis Bandaraya Melaka — Source: Uwe Aranas / Wikimedia Commons.

Naturally, as the project involves two different countries, it will need the agreement and cooperation of both before it can proceed. The construction of the tunnel will take between four and five years, but the negotiations could really go either way.

It’s also not the first time such a project was brought up. According to Rnggt, talks to build such an undersea tunnel was previously brought up back in 1998 and 2013. According to the report, what’s different this time is that Indonesia intends to connect all of the nearby islands via expressways. The undersea tunnel may be able to piggyback on such an effort. But it remains to be seen if it will go anywhere this time when it fell through twice before.

(Source: Rnggt)