The once neglected Sentul Depot with a history dating back to 1905 was one of the biggest and finest integrated engineering workshops in the world, employing some 5,000 people in its heyday. Its activities included assembling and servicing railway carriages.​

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the Federal Malay States Railway (FMSR) began building a complex to house railway maintenance workshops in Sentul, known as the Central Railway Workshops.

 

Occupying an estimated 5.2ha, Sentul Depot, with a footprint of 18,580 sq m, operated long before Malaya’s independence from British rule in 1957. At its height, the depot even built train parts to serve the rail network in India.

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It was the heart of FMSR locomotive storage and maintenance in the Federated States of Malaya, and after 1948, Malayan Railways, later known as Keretapi Tanah Melayu.