Chap.3 Geophysical Attributes of Shah Alam

This study is about the geophysical aspects of Shah Alam. It covers first, the proneness of flooding in Shah Alam and its stormwater drainage solutions. Secondly, the cooling effects and air quality in Shah Alam, and thirdly, the green infrastructure and built environment in Shah Alam.

Feasibility of Low Impact Development. According to MIMWA Group, the rapid urbanization of Shah Alam has been the main cause of flash floods in the city’s experiences. The Group agrees with Misni and Shafuddin’s study (2017) in seeking to understand the depth of the problem and discuss environmental Low Impact Development techniques (LID) by utilizing landscaping in part of the city. Three design solutions were proposed by the authors (Misni & Shafuddin, 2017), which include rain garden, rainwater harvesting, and vegetated swales. These design approaches were proposed in a masterplan with sufficient absorbance potential, to help combat flash floods, and provide proper drainage. Most importantly, they were estimated to decrease water runoff by as much as 7.9%. In lieu of lacking more costing details for the new landscaping approaches, MIMWA Group suggests to look at budgets for comparison to previous implementations of LID in Malaysia for accurate estimation.

Cost-efficiency and Regional Suitability for Low Impact Development. According to MIMWA Group, another study had also implementated LID techniques in Malaysia to avoid and mitigate flooding issues (Pour et al., 2020) with cost-efficiency and better effectiveness. The study by Pour et al. (2020) found that LID can be a cost-effective solution to the regional issue of flash flooding, with permeable pavement being most effective for short-term heavy rainfall, and bio-retention cells and storage layers being more suitable for longer periods of exposure. These LID techniques can help control unexpected randomizing factors due to climatic issues, and are best used when they are integrated into existing infrastructure in an area. Due to lack of studies in Malaysia, MIMWA Group suggested more studies at regional level to compare effective LID techniques in neighboring countries with similar conditions.

Early Flood Warning Systems for Flash Flood Prevention. MIMWA Group studied another study by Omar, et al. (2020) who highlighted the design of mobile-based decision support for the early flood warning system. The authors had indicated that to minimize loss of life and economic losses, a detailed and comprehensive decision-making tool is necessary for both floods to control planning and emergency service operations. The study showcased the design for mobile-based decision support of Flood Early Warning System (FEWS) where it outlined four research objectives: 1) identify critical criteria for flood risk assessment; 2) develop a measurement model for relative flood risk using Geographic Information System (GIS), Multi-Attribute Decision Making (MADM) and data mining technique; 3) develop a holistic architectural design by incorporating the communication technology and other related ICT requirements for the mobile decision support; and 4) validate the mathematical model and architectural design. The proposed system is set for mobile early flood warning systems, and MIMWA Group recommends exploring the role of people’s awareness on flood prevention and their advance prevention preparation as opposed to depending on a technology without any personal preparation efforts.

Green Infrastructure and Grey Infrastructure Hybrid System as Urban Drainage Resilience Enhancement. MIMWA Group also looks at a study in China (Dong et al., 2017) for improving data and analytics regarding urban drainage systems’ efficiency to the main causes of flooding The researchers challenged other existing studies, by pointing out their inconsideration of irregular disturbances to the urban drainage systems, such as climate change and urbanization. Instead, it proposes a hybrid solution that uses green infrastructure and grey infrastructure, green roofs, permeable pavement, and water storage tanks. The study shows that, when considering possible random factors, 20% of the total area studied would equate to a 30% increase of urban drainage resilience for green roofs, 33% for permeable pavement, and 4 water storage tanks would equate to a 17% improvement. However, although effective, the costs of these solutions are linear with the total area using them, which means if the city were to seek peak improvement, it would be more costly than minor introductions of these hybrid systems. MIMWA Group recommends such hybrid system for Shah Alam. In lieu of lacking long-term data to guide Shah Alam’s planning, it suggests to look at more similar cases to set a baseline approach for future considerations besides looking into multiple ways to combine different strategies for improving effectiveness.

Geospatial Approach to Detecting Leaks in Water Distribution Networks. MIMWA Group reviewed a study in Shah Alam to develop a new geospatial approach to detect leaks in water distribution networks (Aburawe et al., 2017). The study (Aburawe et al., 2017) refers to ongoing extensive research work to develop a new geospatial approach to detect leaks in water distribution networks and reviews a summary for field data collection procedures and modeling analysis. It uses the SCADA system in this geospatial approach to obtain the real-time data and can be used as the baseline for future research in seeking accurate data with SCADA.

Sustainable Drainage System (SuDS). According to the Shah Alam Future Group, a study by Hoang and Fenner (2016) discussed the system interactions of stormwater management using sustainable urban drainage systems and green infrastructure. The authors explore system interactions of stormwater management solutions using the Sustainable Urban Drainage System (SuDS) and Green Infrastructure (GI) within the wider urban landscape. In their study, the researchers stated that a series of interdependencies between urban components relating to stormwater management have been identified which include physical interdependency, geographical interdependency, cyber interdependency, and logical interdependency. The stormwater management using SuDS/GI are viewed according to their Hydrological, Ecological, and the Built Environment functions during events up to the design rain (non-flood condition) and during controlled exceedance and uncontrolled inundation (flood condition). The study lacks detailed explanations about potential technical solution for stormwater management using sustainable infrastructure and looks forward to see future SuDs solution for stormwater management in a city.

Cooling Effects and Modifications for Environment Thermal Comfort. MIMWA Group found Tukiran et al. (2016) presenting a simulative approach to evaluate and determine the cooling effect of greening modification developments of a study area on the surrounding environment. The study comprises of two approaches, including an on-site measurement and a numerical simulation model that uses ENVI-met V 4.0 BETA that was limited to a local building. It would be good if the approach can be extended to different places, too.

Improving air quality. According to the Synergistic Shah Alam, Kristen A. Sanchez et al, (2020) emphasize that the air quality is being improved in some cities by targeted urban policy interventions. Kristen A. Sanchez, et.al (2020) stated the with increasing urban population growth, there will be higher number of people having risk in the traffic-related air pollutant (TRAP). The control method of air pollution is divided into three categories which are source emission control, pollution control equipment, rules, and regulations. While their study attempts to reduce traffic emission pollution (TRAP), Synergistic Shah Alam recommends a similar study for Shah Alam.

Effects of air pollution towards climate and material. According to the Shah Alam Future, Saudi. M, et.al (2017) stated air pollution is causing bad effects on living beings and bringing damage to the climate and materials, and the urbanization process is causing air quality degradation in Malaysia. The findings of the research also show that the source of air pollution in Shah Alam is due to high combustion and emission from vehicles. It shows that the number of motor vehicles, industries, and other activities is higher, therefore it increases NO2, O3, and PM10 formation and CO2 emission. The research found humidity and the present temperature can help on reducing the concentration of air pollution, but it may become worse by years especially during the dry seasons in Shah Alam. A solution for controlling air pollution in Shah Alam is by reducing vehicular transportation into the city. In summary, more data will be required to accurately manage air pollution in Shah Alam.

Economy and green infrastructure. According to the Shah Alam Future, (Khoshnava et al. 2020) discussed the contribution of green infrastructure to the implementation of the green economy in the context of sustainable development. The authors explained that concurrence of opinion between infrastructure and economy can integrate natural resources and environmental services into the national income and wealth account. They found there discrepancies between mutual effects of green infrastructure (GI) and green economy (GE) and went on to develop the influences of GI criteria into the implementation of GE in the context of sustainable development (SD) using novel hybrid methods. The result show that the affordability and resource efficiency categories were found to empower green infrastructure for the implementation of the green economy in the sustainable development context. While their study is linking economic growth and green infrastructure, Shah Alam Future is recommending such solution to consider the welfare of residents by benefiting such implementations.

Environmental and natural resource implications of sustainable urban infrastructure systems. According to the Shah Alam Future, Bergesen et al. (2017), point the implications of the environmental and natural resource on sustainable urban infrastructure systems where they had deeply analyzed the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, water use, metal consumption, and land use of selected socio-technical systems in 84 cities by using hybrid life cycle assessment approach combined with scenarios. Bergesen et al. (2017), propose some of the scenarios to each city and quantified their potentials in reducing the environmental and resource impacts. They found resource-efficient urban infrastructure and decarbonization of electricity coupled with strategic densification have the potential to mitigate the resources and environmental footprints of growing cities. Lacking strategies into real life applications, Shah Alam Future recommends for new ways to strategize resource-efficient urban infrastructure that can be accepted by the public.

Malay Garden Concept. According to the group MIMWA, the study (Zakaria et al., 2019) highlights experts’ understanding, knowledge and experience about Malaysian Garden Design. It is recognized that the idea of the Malaysian Garden has been around for a long time, but it has various paths depending on who defines it, according to many different views of meaning by the experts (Zakaria et al., 2019). The Malaysian Garden concept does not necessarily mean the Malay Garden because of the different design requirements, and the Malaysian Garden should be able to represent all of the country's leading ethnic group and cannot focus on only one ethnic groups, according to some definitions of the concept. The lack of standardization in the definition of this concept might be one of the reasons why it is not found more commonly around the country, therefore the authors suggest doing rebranding to the concept, to increase the number of outdoor attractions and stakeholders involved with the concept.

In general, adopting sustainable infrastructure for a city must cover the larger scale perspective for improving its efficiency. Among them includes balancing economic growth with alignment of green infrastructure may require strategies of resource-efficient urban infrastructure and decarbonization of electricity coupled with strategic densification. On the other hand, a simpler review would be in obtaining the public and professionals’ perspective regarding Malaysian Garden design.

In summary, several potential flooding mitigation approaches are highlighted. They include implementing green and grey infrastructure hybrid solutions to the site of the project and studying costs implications using LID approach. Besides using mobile warning and detection systems for floods in Shah Alam, recommendations for raising awareness for preparation among people regarding floods is highlighted. More green and grey infrastructure hybrid systems are called for further studies in addition to using different types of systems to detect leaks and malfunctions in piping systems. Finally, it does make sense to conduct a perception survey on implementation of sustainable infrastructure in order to align both the needs and their benefits.

Aburawe et al. (2013). Field Case Study to Validate A Geospatial Approach For Locating Leakage in Water Distribution Networks - Field Data Collection and Modeling Analysis. (Case Study in Shah Alam, Malaysia). International Journal of Technology Enhancement and Emerging , 1(5), 6–12. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330038734_Field_Case_Study_To_Validate_A_Geospatial_Approach_For_Locating_Leakage_In_Water_Distribution_Networks__Field_Data_Collection_And_Modeling_Analysis_Case_Study_In_Shah_Alam_Malaysia

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Dong, X., Guo, H., & Zeng, S. (2017). Enhancing future resilience in urban drainage system: Green versus grey infrastructure. Water Research, Vol. 124, 280-289. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.watres.2017.07.038

Hoang, L., & R. A. Fenner. (2016). “System Interactions of Stormwater Management Using Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems and Green Infrastructure.” Urban Water Journal 13(7):739–58.

Khoshnava et al. (2020). “Contribution of Green Infrastructure to the Implementation of Green Economy.

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Pour et al. (2020). Low Impact Development Techniques to Mitigate the Impacts of Climate-Change-Induced Urban Floods: Current Trends, Issues and Challenges. Sustainable Cities and Society, Vol. 62. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scs.2020.102373

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Shakir, A., Saudi, M., & Abu, I. F. (2017). The assessment of ambient air pollution pattern in Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia. 2016 (November). DOI: https://doi.org/10.4314/jfas.v9i4s.43

Tukiran, J. M., Ariffin, J., & Abdul Ghani, A. N. (2017). A Study on the cooling effects of greening for improving the outdoor thermal environment in penang, Malaysia. International Journal of GEOMATE, 12(34), 62–70. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21660/2017.34.2677

Zakaria, A. Z., Dali, M. M., & Hussein, H. (2019). Understanding and Interpreting the Concept of Malaysian Garden Design: Experts Conferring. International Journal of Recent Technology and Engineering (IJRTE), Vol. 8. DOI: 10.35940/ijrte.B1110.0982S1119