Everything About the Opening of the 3rd Stage of TEL That’ll Reduce a Lot of Travel Time from Woodlands to Orchard


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11 MRT stations along the Thomson-East Coast Line (TEL), from Stevens to Marina Bay and Gardens by the Bay, are slated for public access by the end of 2022.

This means that for commuters who start at their daily journeys at Woodlands, there is finally a direct train ride to Orchard. Goodbye train transfers and long bus rides, because transport convenience is simply lovely.

Stage Three of Thomson-East Coast Line

Image: sgtrains.com

Out of the five stages in the development of TEL, Stage 3 is arguably the most significant.

It connects to the Downtown Line at Stevens, the green and purple lines at Outram Park, and ends at destinations around Marina Bay.

On Wednesday (17 Aug), the Land Transport Authority (LTA) announced it handed over the 11 stations to SMRT so further testing on the signalling systems can be conducted over the next few months to ensure smooth operations after its opening in the second half of 2022.

LTA has also reassured commuters that the systems utilised by TEL Stage 3 have been “rigorously tested” and will not affect the safety and operations of existing MRT systems.

For one, the preliminary testing of the signalling system was hosted on test servers separate from the operational systems used for TEL stages 1 and 2.     

The integration testing was later conducted during engineering hours before the signalling software supplied by French train manufacturer Alstom was integrated into the operational servers running TEL stages 1 to 3.

This took place between 26 February and 29 May, wherein the TEL train service started later on weekends to fit in additional engineering hours.

There will be two more stations in TEL Stage 3, namely Marina South and Mouth Pleasant stations, which will open at a later date in tandem with the developments in the surrounding area.

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Final Two Stages

The last two legs of TEL are composed of 10 stations from Founder’s Memorial to Sungei Bedok.

Stages 4 and 5 are expected to open around 2024 and 2025 respectively, except Founder’s Memorial’s station which will open in conjunction with the actual memorial in 2027.

Once TEL is completed, over 240,000 households will be within a 10-minute walking distance from a TEL station.

Plus, it will help to alleviate the crowding on the East-West and North-South lines.

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Featured Image: Facebook (Land Transport Authority)