Figure 1: Proposed High Speed Rail Malaysia to Singapore5
stage (at the time of writing), would be the first of
its kind in Malaysia. Prime Ministers of Malaysia
and Singapore jointly announced the project of
HSR on February 19, 2013 and described the
HSR as a ‘Game Changer’. The project’s target is
to be fully operational by 2020. The plan of the
HSR network, devised by Malaysia’s Land Public
Transport Commission (SPAD), is to have seven
stations, two Terminus stations, which are in
Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. There will be five
transit stations, one each in Negeri Sembilan,
Malacca and three in Johor. The HSR will have
two operation systems, which are express (nonstop), and transit journey from Kuala Lumpur to
Singapore. The express journey time is 90 minutes,
while the transit operation will have seven stops
including at terminus station with a 120 minutes
journey time. This journey time does not include
the waiting time and immigration processing.
The trains are expected to run at 300km/hour or
faster. However, average speeds will be lower due
to the slower speed when approaching stations.
Baseline alignment has been developed by SPAD
as shown in Figure 1, but the detailed alignments
remain confidential at this stage. The HSR will
have a dedicated line, which is proposed to be a
double track on a standard gauge.
The HSR project is believed to impact the way
of life for Malaysians and Singaporeans in terms
on social, politics and economics. According to
SPAD, “the main objective of HSR is to reduce
travel time between Kuala Lumpur and Singapore
to 90 minutes by strengthening the link between
two of Southeast Asia’s most vibrant and fastgrowing economic engines compared to the five
to six hours journey time by road or eight hours
by conventional train”. Although plane travel time
is 90 minutes similar to the proposed HSR, the
hassle of long hours waiting before and after
departures will actually give total journey time of
2.5 hours by plane. On the contrary, passenger
can board the HSR at the railway station 15
minutes before departure (see Figure 2). The
introduction of HSR will increase daily journeys
between KL and Singapore will benefit the people
and economies of both countries.
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