Putrajaya

The project was started in 1993 and the federal capital officially moved in 1999, although the site is still far from complete. Putrajaya became a self-governing federal territory (wilayah persekutuan) in 2001, the third in Malaysia after Kuala Lumpur and the little oddball island of Labuan. The name literally means "princes' (putra) success (jaya)". Officially, the site is named in homage to Malaysia's first prime minister, Tunku Abdul Rahman Putra, but odds are it's also a tip of the hat towards the "princes of the soil" (bumiputra), a euphemism for ethnic Malays (as opposed to the richer Chinese minority) and one of the key concepts of Malaysia's affirmative action program. Putrajaya's growth slowed down considerably when the money taps ran dry during the Asian economic crisis of 1998. While things have picked up, the city remains very quiet by Malaysian standards, a giant swath of hilly jungle crisscrossed by largely empty 8-lane highways and the occasional beautifully sculpted but near-deserted lake garden. Inevitably, development isn't always occurring in expected ways: Cyberjaya has to date mostly succeeded in attracting call centers and data warehouses, not R&D laboratories. As of 2018, the population has reached 90,000, still a long way from the planned 300,000. As a result, it has been called "a faded Silicon Valley". The nearest airport is of course the Kuala Lumpur International Airport, developed almost concurrently with Putrajaya itself....