During World War II, after the invading Japanese troops seized Bukit Timah from the defending British, the reservoir lay just beyond in their sights. Although it was successfully captured intact shortly after, the Japanese did not cut off the water supply from the reservoir, although slight damage to the reservoir's facilities like the pumping-stations meant much water was lost instead of being channelled to the city, by then crowded with almost one million British-commanded troops and refugees, which was badly in need for a steady water source. After the British surrender and the subsequent Japanese occupation of Singapore, the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) built a Shinto shrine, Syonan Jinja, in the middle of the dense forest surrounding MacRitchie Reservoir. When the British forces re-occupied Singapore in 1945, the shrine was destroyed either by British soldiers, or by the Japanese themselves. Its ruins remain to this day but it is located in a restricted-access nature reserve and visitors are asked not to try to reach it largely due to safety reasons. The National Heritage Board declared the site a Historic Site in 2002, although no plans have been made public to develop or to protect the site.