You could always walk from KLCC to Bukit Bintang, but it wasn’t easy. Before the arrival of disrupters like Uber and Grab, getting between the Kuala Lumpur City Centre and Bukit Bintang was a nightmare. The journey is a little over one kilometre.
Taxis were the only alternative to walking on hot roads, not suitable for foot traffic. Plus they were notorious for ignoring the meter for people they thought were tourists and charged ‘an arm and a leg’ for a relatively short distance.
The elevated walkway – KLCC to Bukit Bintang
Enter the KLCC to Bukit Bintang elevated walkway which will take you safely between two major shopping and entertainment areas in central Kuala Lumpur. It’s open every day between 6:00 AM and 11:00 PM. Using the facility is free and tickets are not required.
The walkway is a 1.173km-long pedestrian bridge connecting the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre to Pavilion shopping mall and other buildings between. However, this distance includes several entrance and exit points along the bridge, with escalators and staircases. The point to point walk is about 500m.
KLCC to Bukit Bintang elevated walkway, showing the walking route in blue, exits in green.
The walkway opened in 2012 and is one of two walkways in the city that keep pedestrians above the traffic and offer easy connections to buildings along the route. The other, which we have yet to review, is the Jalan Sultan Ismail Pedestrian Walkway, Kuala Lumpur between the Sultan Ismail LRT station and Medan Tuanku Monorail Station, built in 2014.
Using the walkway
Setting out from Suria KLCC shopping centre in Kuala Lumpur, you can choose to walk through the park to the KL Convention Centre, which is the starting point for the elevated walkway. If you prefer to stay cool, use the tunnel near the supermarket on the LG floor in the Mall, to walk underground to the LG floor of the Convention Centre.
From the park, enter the KL Convention Centre and turn left, walking along to the central lift lobby. You’ll have a lovely view of the park. The tunnel from the Mall is directly below.
When you reach the lift lobby, take the lift or escalator down to the Food Court. Walk round the Food Court and turn left following the signs to Aquaria. At the Aquaria entrance, turn right up the escalator and turn right outside the glass doors.
The entrance to the KLCC to Bukit Bintang Walkway is straight ahead, up the escalator, which will take you directly to the walkway. There’s also a lift behind the escalator.
The walkway is covered all the way and it’s glassed in so it’s cool. As you don’t have to walk out on the roads, it’s safe and easy. There’s a large signboard at the first corner, which is helpful as it lists various attractions and buildings along the way and at either end.
Along the way, you can identify different buildings and down on to the roads. You can leave at a number of points on the way. There are entrances/exits for buildings, streets and public transport. Signboards from the ceiling indicate the destination.
The journey along the 5 metre wide walkway took between 10 and 15 minutes, just strolling along, though you could do the trip much more quickly. Only the entrance and exit sections aren’t glassed in. The elevated walkway joins directly with the pedestrian walkway located on the 3rd floor of Pavilion Mall (Level 3) which is lined with restaurants. There’s also a very extensive food court on the lower ground floor. The entrance at the other end of Level 3 opens out into Jalan Bukit Bintang.
Kuala Lumpur City Centre (KLCC) is a multipurpose development area in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It’s home to the world’s tallest twin towers, the Petronas Twin Towers. Development began after the 100 acre site was vacated by the Selangor Turf Club race track in 1992 after occupying the site for almost 100 years.
Images ©ET
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