Video Link (CNA Chinese):
http://video2.channelnewsasia.com/cnavideos/chineseplayer.asp?skin=Player1.swf&player=chineseplayer.swf&filename=xin_ch_wed03.flv
Article on Straits Times (13 Aug
2009): http://www.straitstimes.com/Singapore/Story/STIStory_415954.html
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<!-- headline one : end --> Remaining 33 above-ground
stations to get them from next January <!-- Author --> By Yeo
Ghim Lay <!-- show image if available --> 
<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"-->
THE first sets of platform screen doors designed to keep people
off the train tracks went up yesterday at Pasir Ris MRT
station.
Jurong East and Yishun stations will be next and all three
stations will have doors fitted by the end of the year.The
remaining 33 above-ground MRT stations will get them from January
next year.
The doors, which open only when a train pulls into the station,
will prevent commuters from falling onto the tracks - intentionally
or otherwise.
Such incidents have gone up over the years, from an average of
16 cases a year in 2004 and 2005 to 31 in 2007.
Last year, there were 23 cases of commuters straying onto the
tracks. Six of these were due to accidental loss of balance.
This year alone, two commuters have died after falling off
station platforms and being hit by approaching trains.
Such incidents have prompted repeated calls for platform screen
doors by Members of Parliament and commuters.
But it was only early last year that the Government gave the
go-ahead for the doors to be installed, saying that the cost of
such doors had come down.
The Land Transport Authority (LTA) is spending $126 million on
the project and aims to complete work on the remaining 33 stations
by 2012.
It will take four to six months to prepare each MRT station and
to install the doors. 'We can carry out work only when the trains
are not running at night. This leaves us with just 21/2 hours each
night to do the work,' said Mr Chua Chong Kheng, LTA's group
director of rail (Thomson and existing lines).
While commuters feel the doors should have gone up sooner, they
say it is better late than never. Accountant Quek Ei Bing, 29,
said: 'I always see people going over the yellow line at station
platforms so they can board the train quickly and get a seat. It is
really dangerous, someone might just nudge you from behind and you
could fall.'
MP Lim Wee Kiak, chairman of the Government Parliamentary
Committee for Transport, welcomed the start of work to install the
platform doors, but hoped that more will be done to keep commuters
safe in the meantime. 'Perhaps the authorities can look at some
temporary low-cost solutions, such as moving the platform's yellow
line inwards.'
Currently, the doors already installed at Pasir Ris station
remain open as trains are still running. Signs have been put up to
inform commuters about the works, and commuters will be reminded by
station staff to stand behind the yellow line.
Testing of the doors at Pasir Ris station will take place next
month, after the full 48 sets of doors go up on the platform.
Singapore Technologies Electronics, which won the contract to
install the doors, is carrying out the works.
The doors will operate like the full-height doors in underground
MRT stations. Trains will not be able to move off if the platform
screen doors are still open.
Signalling systems will synchronise the screen doors with train
doors and sensors will detect things caught in between.
Made of tempered glass, the doors will be able to withstand
heavy wind and impact - up to 150kg per sq m, to be exact, said the
LTA.
'They will be as strong as the full-height doors in underground
stations,' said Mr Chua.
Singapore is not the first city to have half-height platform
screen doors in its train stations. Such doors are currently found
at some stations in Taipei and Paris.
Besides the doors, the Government is also spending $29 million
on more closed-circuit television sets in MRT stations to boost
commuter safety.
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