From 16 April 2017, the trial of the new signalling system for the North-South Line (NSL) will be extended to a full day on Sundays. This follows the successful weekday trials during the last hour of passenger service since 28 March 2017.
2. The all-day trial on Sundays is expected to last two months. Trains leaving the depot at the start of service on Sundays will be controlled by the new signalling system for the full day of service. This no longer requires the 10-minute pause in train services during signalling switchover that commuters experienced during the earlier trials on weekday nights.
3. The Sunday trials will allow the Land Transport Authority (LTA) and SMRT to further test the new signalling system’s reliability as it carries out full-day passenger service. During the trial, engineers will monitor the system’s response to different situations, and trains services’ adherence to their schedules, as the number of trains running on the new system is gradually increased.
4. The progressive roll out of the trial will also allow LTA and SMRT to address any issues with the new system as soon as they are discovered, and minimise any inconvenience to commuters. The results of the trial will help LTA and SMRT in deciding when to fully implement the new signalling system on the NSL.
Introduction of New Trains Equipped with the New Signalling System
5. The upgraded signalling system allows us to add up to 57 new trains, which are only fitted with the new signalling system. The new trains are part of the overall plan to expand capacity on the North-South and East-West Lines (NSEWL), and will be gradually added to increase train frequency and shorten waiting times.
6. Forty-five of these new trains have arrived in Singapore progressively since May 2015 and have been put through rigorous tests for operational readiness. The safety, functionality, passenger comfort and performances of the new trains and their subsystems have been tested and validated through an established test sequence of stringent tests. The first of the new trains will begin passenger service on the NSL this Sunday, 16 April 2017.
