wildsingapore news: Aug 16, 2014

Kelly Ng Today Online 15 Aug 14;

SINGAPORE — A mix of industrial and residential sites along with parts of a golf course will be acquired by the Government to build the Thomson-East Coast Line (TEL).

Of the over 24,000sqm of land to be acquired by the Singapore Land Authority (SLA), about three quarters of it will come from Laguna National Golf & Country Club, an area that still comprises less than 1 per cent of the club’s total land space.

Speaking at a media conference on the TEL yesterday (Aug 15) SLA Director of Land Sales and Acquisition Thong Wai Lin said some acquisition was unavoidable given how Singapore is densely built-up.

“What we try to do is to work very closely with LTA to keep the acquisition to the minimum, by making sure the design of the station, the construction, the alignment itself as well, would ensure acquisition is kept to the most minimal,” she said.

Also to be acquired to make way for Amber Station on the nine-station line are six semi-detached houses along Amber Road and a three-storey apartment block on Tanjong Katong Road.

Eight partial lots will also be acquired, including industrial plots at 3 Changi South St 2 and 10 Changi South St 3, which are managed by JTC Corporation.

Laguna National, which is building a 200-room five star hotel, welcomed the news. “With one of the stations less than 500m from our front door, our members, future hotel guests and staff will find accessibility and convenience tremendously improved,” said Mr Patrick Bowers, the club’s CEO and managing director.

Mr Bowers also highlighted that playing areas and golfing holes would not be affected by the land acquisition.

In response to TODAY’s queries, JTC Corporation, which would see some of its carpark lots and driveways affected by the land acquisition, said it will work with the LTA and its two lessees to assess the impact and, if necessary, explore alternative arrangements and possible relocation options.

In contrast, affected residents at Amber Road and Tanjong Katong Road reacted with greater furore.

Many were shocked when they heard the news for the first time after SLA and LTA officers served the notices yesterday. Residents have been given 18 months to move out.

Mr Hue K Y, 64, who lives with his family of five on Amber Road, said the announcement was like “dropping a bombshell“. He was upset that the authorities had not consulted residents on the plans and wanted to know if they had considered alternative locations for the station, such as a park space behind the row of houses.

Mr Hue also felt the 18-month notice period was “too tight“ as he had spent more than five years looking for his current self-designed house. The family has lived there for the last 14 years.

Mrs Chong, who spent S$1m renovating her Amber Road home, said her family expects fair compensation and hopes the authorities will take into consideration the costs of renovations and relocating.

Mr Sim Chiang Lee, 79, who operates Sin Aik Provision Shop on Tanjong Katong Road, was upset that he would have to give up a business that he spent more than four decades building up.

“We probably don’t need an MRT station here, residents in this area don’t usually travel by MRT anyway,” he said in Mandarin. Mr Sim owns another three units in the same apartment block, which will be fully acquired to build the line.

The SLA will be discussing with landowners on the submission of claims next month and it will announce their compensation award in six months.

Golf course to provide most of land acquired for new line
Kelly Ng Today Online 16 Aug 14;

SINGAPORE — A mix of industrial and residential sites along with parts of a golf course will be acquired by the Government to build the Thomson-East Coast Line (TEL).

Of the more than 24,000 sq m of land to be acquired by the Singapore Land Authority (SLA), about three-quarters will come from Laguna National Golf and Country Club — the area acquired, however, comprises less than 1 per cent of the club’s total land space.

Speaking at a media conference on the TEL yesterday, SLA director of land sales and acquisition, Ms Thong Wai Lin, said acquisition was unavoidable, given how densely built-up Singapore is. “What we try to do is work very closely with LTA to keep acquisition to a minimum, by making sure the design of the station, construction and alignment would ensure acquisition is kept to the most minimal,” she said.

Also to be acquired to make way for Amber Station on the 31-station line are six semi-detached houses along Amber Road and a three-storey apartment block in Tanjong Katong Road. Eight partial lots will be acquired too, including the industrial plots at 3 Changi South Street 2 and 10 Changi South Street 3, which are managed by JTC Corporation.

Laguna National, which is building a 200-room five-star hotel, welcomed the news. “With one of the stations less than 500m from our front door, our members, future hotel guests and staff will find accessibility and convenience tremendously improved,” said Mr Patrick Bowers, the club’s CEO and managing director.

In contrast, affected residents inAmber Road and Tanjong Katong Road reacted to the news with greater furore. Many were shocked when they heard the news for the first time after notices were served by SLA and LTA officers yesterday. Residents have been given 18 months to move out.

Mr Hue K Y, 64, who has lived along Amber Road with his family of five for the past 14 years, said the announcement was like “dropping a bombshell”. He was upset that the authorities had not consulted residents and wanted to know if they had considered alternative locations for the station, such as a park space behind the row of houses.

Mrs Chong, who has spent S$1 million renovating her Amber Road home, said her family expects fair compensation and hopes the authorities will take into consideration “the costs of renovation, finishings and relocating”.

Mr Sim Chiang Lee, 79, who operates Sin Aik Provision Shop on Tanjong Katong Road, was upset that he would have to give up a business that he had spent more than four decades building. “We probably don’t need an MRT station here. Residents in this area don’t usually travel by MRT anyway,” he said in Mandarin. Mr Sim also owns three units of the apartment block in Tanjong Katong Road that will be fully acquired to build the line.

The SLA will be discussing with landowners on the submission of claims next month and will announce their compensation award in six months.

Thomson-East Coast Line, connecting North and East, ready by 2024
Saifulbahri Ismail Channel NewsAsia 15 Aug 14;

SINGAPORE: The country's sixth rail line - the Thomson-East Coast Line (TEL) - will be fully operational by 2024, the Land Transport Authority announced on Friday (Aug 15).

The previously-announced Eastern Region Line and the Thomson Line will be joined to form the single, continuous line, which will span about 43 kilometres with a total of 31 stations, seven of which will be interchanges.

Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew, speaking at a visit to the soon-to-open Marina South Pier Station on Friday, said that when fully operational in 2024, the TEL will serve about 500,000 commuters daily. This could rise to 1 million passengers daily in the longer term.

The East Coast part of the TEL is budgeted to cost $6.8 billion, bringing the total cost of the TEL to about $24 billion. The Land Transport Authority will also build Singapore's first underground bicycle parks at MRT stations. They will be located at Marine Parade, Marine Terrace, Bayshore, and Sungei Bedok stations.

FROM THE NORTH TO THE EAST

The line will provide direct connectivity for commuters in the north and the east of Singapore - starting at Woodlands and heading south through the Central Business District, then turning east at Gardens by the Bay station and travelling along a East Coast stretch that will be fully underground.

One of the nine stations on this stretch will serve as an interchange with Downtown Line 3 Extension (DTL3e) - a 2.2km line consisting of two stations, meant to improve accessibility to the Changi Business Park and Expo areas.

The East Coast stretch will also cover areas not currently served by the rail network such as Siglap, Marine Parade, Upper East Coast and Bedok South. Seven of the stations, from Tanjong Rhu to Bayshore, will be ready by 2023, while remainder of the line, as well as the DTL3e, will be completed the year after.

Also scheduled for completion in 2024 is a new 36-hectare depot, touted by the LTA as "the world's first four-in-one train and bus depot". The new structure, which is the size of about 60 football fields, will be able to house a total of 220 trains for the TEL, DTL and East West Line, as well as 550 buses.

"Making the elevated train depot is a very hard thing to do, because trains are very, very heavy. So, this is typically not done in many parts of the world, where there is more supply of land. So, this will be a challenge," said Dr Park Byung Joon, Head of the Urban Transport Management at the Singapore Institute of Management (SIM).

Construction of the East Coast stretch is expected to start in 2016. To build the line, the Government will need to acquire six landed properties along Amber Road and one three-storey apartment along Tanjong Katong Road, as well as nine part lots elsewhere. The Singapore Land Authority on Friday gazetted the properties affected by acquisition, and said it would work closely with landowners throughout the process.

CONVENIENCE A CONSIDERATION

The LTA said that with the TEL, someone going from the East Coast to Orchard MRT station will have his travel time cut by half an hour, from 75 minutes to 45 minutes. A Republic Polytechnic student will be able to travel to Marine Parade in an hour, 20 minutes faster than the current bus ride would take.

Also, stations along the TEL will see longer underpasses of up to 400m long, as part of efforts to improve "first and last mile connectivity", particularly for the elderly and children, the LTA said.

However, the Thomson-East Coast Line comes with some challenges, said the Transport Minister. "The corridors along Tanjong Rhu and Marine Parade areas are very tight, and this is made more difficult by the extensive network of utilities structures and services that are in the area. Significant sewage and canal diversions, as well as complex road works, will be required for the construction," Mr Lui said.

- CNA/es

Better compensation for land-owners affected by Thomson-East Coast Line development
Saifulbahri Ismail and Olivia Siong Channel NewsAsia 15 Aug 14;

SINGAPORE: Some property owners affected by land acquisition from the development of the Thomson-East Coast Line can expect better compensation. Property analysts say this is because of recent changes to the Land Acquisition Act.

Amendments passed in Parliament last week (Aug 5), saw the removal of the "betterment levy" - a fee imposed on the compensation a land owner gets. This fee is equivalent to the rise in value of the area around the acquired land as a result of developments.

Six landed properties along Amber Road, and a three-storey apartment along Tanjong Katong Road will be acquired by the Government, to make way for construction of the eastern part of the Thomson-East Coast Line.

The Singapore Land Authority (SLA) says all efforts have been made to minimise land acquisition. SLA's Land Sales and Acquisition Director Thong Wai Lin: "So far we are acquiring only for the Thomson-East Coast Line this portion of the eastern region line we're acquiring 24,136.4 sq m, the bulk of it is from Laguna Golf and Country Club. So, about 6,480 sq m are from the residential, and industrial properties, and we're only affecting 15 residential properties, nine strata units, and six landed properties."

Laguna Golf and Country Club says authorities started engaging them about the acquisition since April this year. The Club says none of the holes are affected, and believes the new MRT Line will be a boost for members, guests and staff.

Affected residents have been served notices by the Singapore Land Authority. Many say the notice came as a surprise. One affected landowner, Mr Sim, told us he was "heartbroken": "I spent the last 50 years on this business and now they ask you to move, you have to do so."

Property analysts expect affected owners to be well compensated. Said Mr Desmond Sim, Head of Research at CBRE Research: "The thing about land acquisition is that the new law that has been passed, is that it allows land acquisition to be on full market value. They have disregarded the reduction of the betterment value. So I think those people affected by this land acquisition will be better compensated going forward."

Next month, the Singapore Land Authority will meet with affected land owners on the submission of claims. They will know the compensation award in six months.

- CNA/xy

Single MRT line to link East Coast to Woodlands
Xue Jianyue Today Online 16 Aug 14;

SINGAPORE — By 2024, residents living along the island’s east coast can take a continuous MRT ride to the Central Business District or up north to places such as Woodlands, without having to switch trains or hop onto buses.

Apart from greater convenience, travel times will be slashed too: For example, it will take only 45 minutes, instead of 75 minutes by bus, to travel from East Coast Park to Orchard. To get from Woodlands to Marine Parade, it will take about an hour, compared with 80 minutes by bus.

Yesterday, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) announced that the Thomson Line and the Eastern Region Line will be renamed as a single line — the Thomson-East Coast Line (TEL).

It also gave details of the alignment of the nine-station eastern stretch, which will run from Sungei Bedok to Tanjong Rhu and include places such as Katong Park, Siglap and Bayshore.

Construction will start in 2016. Of the nine stations, seven are targeted for opening by 2023, while the Bedok South and Sungei Bedok Stations are slated for operations a year later.

The alignment of the 22-station northern stretch was announced previously; the line will serve areas such as Shenton Way, Havelock, Mount Pleasant, Upper Thomson and Woodlands South.

The eastern end of the Downtown Line will also be extended by two new stations to link up with the TEL, which will be fully underground.

Speaking to the reporters on the sidelines of a visit to the Marina South Pier Station — which will be opened by the end of the year — Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew said: “The Thomson Line and Eastern Region Line had been planned to run as one single line ... So, rather than having two separate names ... and to make it easier for commuters, we have decided to re-name (the lines) as the Thomson-East Coast Line.”

He added: “A single line, instead of two separate lines, will allow us to reap economies of scale and operational efficiencies from having common systems and trains.”

The 31-station TEL is budgeted to cost about S$24 billion. Mr Lui noted the construction challenges adding to costs for the eastern stretch, such as the extensive network of utilities structures and services. Significant sewage and canal diversions, as well as complex road work, will be required, he said.

Consisting of seven interchanges, the line is expected to serve half a million commuters daily in the initial years and up to twice the figure in the longer term.

On the fact that the TEL’s eastern stretch will serve several areas dominated by private properties, LTA CEO Chew Hock Yong noted that it is inevitable that MRT lines will run through high- and low-density areas to link up the population centres.

He added that he hopes the new line will encourage car owners living in these areas to switch to public transport. “We certainly hope to see (the) Singaporean population (being) less reliant on private cars, because there is only so much we can grow the road space,” he said.

He said that with the addition of the TEL, commuters would have the option of using another MRT line if there is disruption on a particular stretch.

Dr Park Byung Joon, head of the urban transport management programme at SIM University, said the new line would help reduce congestion on the East-West Line, given that the TEL’s eastern stretch runs almost parallel to the East-West Line.

Property analysts were divided on the impact of the new line on property prices. Some felt the noise and inconvenience caused by the construction of the line — which the LTA has pledged to minimise — would adversely affect the value of nearby properties. And when the stations are completed, properties that are near the line may also have issues with noise and privacy.

Others pointed out that prices of nearby properties would go up, given the increased convenience and connectivity.

The value of properties located within walking distance from a station is likely to rise the most, said Mr Nicholas Mak, executive director of SLP International Property Consultants. Owners of these properties looking to sell their units could increase asking prices by 5 per cent to 10 per cent, but these would be subject to other market forces, he added.

$6.8b East Coast line by 2024
Christopher Tan The Straits Times AsiaOne 16 Aug 14;

SINGAPORE - A new addition to Singapore's expanding rail network was announced yesterday - a 13km, nine-station line tracing the east coast shoreline which, for the first time, will allow picnickers to get to East Coast Park by MRT.

Extending from the recently announced Thomson Line - which has now been renamed the Thomson-East Coast Line (TEL) - it is scheduled to be completed by 2024.

Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew revealed the plans yesterday at the Marina South Pier station - an extension of the North-South Line which will open soon. He said the eastern leg of the TEL is expected to cost $6.8 billion.

Mr Lui said the line will "run almost parallel" to the East-West Line and the future Downtown Line 3, adding: "When completed, rail capacity along the East-West corridor will increase by about 45 per cent."

Travel pattern studies have shown that this corridor accounts for the bulk of morning peak period volume.

First announced by then Communications Minister Yeo Cheow Tong in 2001, the eastern leg of the TEL will go through areas such as Tanjong Rhu, Marine Parade and Siglap. It will serve several residential estates, such as condos in Tanjong Rhu and Bayshore, Housing Board flats in Marine Parade and Bedok South, and low-rise developments in Amber and Tanjong Katong roads.

Schools near the line include St Patrick's, CHIJ Katong, Tao Nan, Victoria School and St Andrew's Autism School. The line will also serve commercial and recreational facilities, such as the Singapore Indoor Stadium and Parkway Parade shopping centre.

Land Transport Authority chief executive Chew Hock Yong said there will be an underground walkway from Parkway Parade to the Marine Parade Community Building two streets away.

Using existing pedestrian underpasses, commuters will be able to get to East Coast Park, which is currently not near any MRT line.

The line will be the first in Singapore to offer underground bicycle parks at stations in Marine Parade, Marine Terrace, Bayshore and Sungei Bedok.

Stations from Tanjong Rhu to Bayshore will be completed by 2023, while Bedok South and Sungei Bedok stations will be ready by 2024 - along with a massive depot to be built next to the existing East-West Line depot in Upper Changi.

The facility will hold 220 trains from the East-West, Downtown and Thomson-East Coast lines, as well as 550 buses.

At its eastern tip, the TEL will have an interchange with Downtown Line 3, which will extend by 2.2km and have a station in Xilin.

This extension will be completed by 2024. The TEL may eventually be extended to join Changi Airport's planned Terminal 5.

Tenders are expected to be called next year with construction starting in 2016.

The project will require more than 24,000 sq m of land to be acquired. The Singapore Land Authority said residential and industrial properties account for only about a quarter of that. The rest will be from the Laguna National Golf and Country Club.

Mr Kevin Kwee, the club's executive director, said the grounds-keeping building, nursery and service areas will have to be moved.

But overall, the development "should be highly positive" as the club will have access to two MRT stations - Xilin and Sungei Bedok.

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