Wait, it’s going to be 2025 already? 2020 still felt like yesterday, wow.
Important note: STC is launching a major project in 2025! Read to end for details, and do join us in this journey to envision better mobility in Singapore together!
And so, we close the doors on yet another year. 2024 has been a very happening year for public transport issues, with everything from setting new records for worst train disruptions, to triple controversies (SimplyGo, 167, ERP 2.0), to big new plans for bus expansion being thrown at us in the short span of mere months. (Whether said expansions actually will work out in the end remains debatable) It’s been dramatic, witnessing these events of great historical significance unfold before our eyes. One thing’s for sure — the year 2024 will not be a mere footnote in the annals of transport history locally. It could well be noted as the pretext to key turning points in policy in the coming year, depending on how the powers interpret the year’s events.
Unfortunately for personal reasons involving larger matters in life I haven’t been posting regularly on the blog for much of the second half of the year between June and November. Fortunately, the Team has pulled through with occasional posts, and hopefully they’ve been intriguing and insightful for readers! I suppose I’m overcompensating for that with the deluge of articles on the site in December — some of those I couldn’t send out in time before I had to pop off to attend to other matters. Nonetheless, with all that’s happening, be assured that the community of Team and readers have been bouncing lots of ideas in their collective minds too!
While at it, we’ve also been cooking with our collective reader base, besides the wacky ideas being exchanged within our Discord server — two special readers have joined our team as Collaborators as part of an upcoming STC project coming out later in 2025! Together, we learn from each other, and the vast world out there, on all the various ways in which our lives and journeys become easier. And as the blog reaches semi-official status in the community — with some recognition as a group out to improve public transportation on the little red dot, it’s heartening to witness more dialogue between Team members, collaborators, readers and many individuals outside our immediate circle. It is in this diversity of thought from which the many nuances of real-life operations and planning are teased out from. We’ve truly come a long way from “a kid yelling into the internet void”, and let’s keep walking this road forward together!
Read to end for a major announcement on this key STC initiative in 2025! TM50 updates attached at the end of this post.
I’m grateful for the STC community and all the quirky ways we come together, be it online or in real life. Together, we make being in the transportation enthusiast community a little less toxic and tiring, for those who seek to discuss the more profound. Earlier in December, when Punggol Coast station opened, we hosted our largest community event to date — with nearly 30 individuals coming together to celebrate the newest addition to the rail network, and ponder the future of transit on our little red dot.
Just looking at all of them, all passionate about making better the way we get around our city, gives me hope that tomorrow will be better, despite the many dark clouds looming over the transport scene locally. Against the backdrop of a bus and train enthusiast community rife with internal division over trivial matters, it’s also a sign of hope that we enthusiasts aren’t the lost cause many believe it to be. When used in the right direction, that weird obsession of nerding over the way our buses and trains work can, and will be taking us places. It’s an exciting time to be.
Similar to last year, the media hasn’t come to knock on our doors. Again, I don’t make too much of it, because frankly STC shouldn’t publish for the sake of media attention — doing that is akin to bending bus planning to fit political KPIs, which we’re beginning to see with the BCEP. But something different happened this year, which caught my attention. Two STC readers, inspired by our work, decided to begin uploading videos discussing various public transport issues, around this year. Granted, both are rather amateur at the business of YouTube essays, but it’s encouraging to see how we’re kickstarting these conversations about the many possibilities urban transport can be here!
It’s great to have the transit commentary corner of local Internet come more alive with more views — our strength in bargaining for better transit policy from LTA / MOT lies in our numbers, and our diversity.
Beyond just a website hosting a blog on transport issues, the community of readers has also grown much around it. It’s time to rethink what the STC identity encompasses again. Increasingly, STC (through the Discord server) is becoming a platform for collaboration and discussion of various public transport issues, not just between the Team and the readers — some newer posts were actually the product of sparks of brilliance erupting within the channels of our cosy server! This opens up possibilities for a future revamp of STC — evolving beyond the current arrangement of a website of articles and a Discord server, to something much more! How will STC look like in 2026 and beyond? We’re still thinking about it.
And the show is only just getting started, for us and for everyone on our little red dot. Two major masterplans are being released in 2025 that will be of significant interest to STC, and likely the entire nation too. URA’s Draft Master Plan 2025 is releasing in April, and it’s a must-watch for all interested in building more livable, people-centric urban habitats for Singaporeans. Within it, lie the answers to the many big land use initiatives for future cities here. From redevelopment plans of PLAB, to the grand visions of the rejuvenated Greater Southern Waterfront and many possibilities on Long Island, what’s in store for us all is exciting, to say the least. The other key highlight of 2025 will also be the expected release of LTMP 2050 (link here to the 2019 edition, for 2040), the updated master blueprint for everything land transport for the coming three decades and beyond.
As we cross into the next phase of development, we won’t be the only ones following these major master plans with great interest — frankly, a lot of what comes next is heavily dependent on what is announced in store for us, going through 2025. Are we on the cusp of major policy shifts, as so intensely hoped for by many? We will find out our answers this year.
With that, let’s take a look at how the site has performed this year.
Like with past years, it’s been a sort of tradition here to list down the top 10 most viewed posts of all time. While some entries have stayed on this list since the first iteration in 2021, it’s nonetheless interesting to observe how interest in certain topics has changed over the years. Interestingly, three of the top 10 all-time most viewed posts this year are about interchanges, and making them better. A renewed desire for better connectivity, perhaps? Here goes:
#1 Fixing the LRT — Sengkang / Punggol (6313 views, Aug 2020)
#2 Interchange types — Singapore edition (4884 views, Jun 2022)
#3 Basics — Interchanges: the good, the bad and the WTF (4493 views, Jul 2020)
#4 10 years on, some lessons have not been learnt (3904 views, Dec 2021)
#5 A radical plan to fix Jurong East (3097 views, Jul 2020)
#6 Why are Japanese trains overcrowded? (2919 views, Jun 2021)
#7 Circle Line Stage 6 — It’s so Screwed Up (2841 views, Jul 2020)
#8 LRT — too light, not rail, not transit? (2630 views, Jul 2020)
#9 Making the case for bendy buses (defunct) (2626 views, Jul 2020)
#10 Alstom Movia R151 — The Review (2599 views, Jun 2023)
What’s perhaps more worthy to note is the top 10 posts *of* 2024 that topped the viewership charts this year. Not surprisingly, the anguish around what’s arguably the worst train disruption in a decade has pushed a couple of posts related to it all the way to the top, despite being relatively recent. Here’s the full list:
#1 Mutual Reliance (1423 views, Sep 2024)
The worst train disruption in more than a decade rocked western Singapore on 25th September, when a train derailed between Clementi and Jurong East, cutting off most of western Singapore from the rest of the rail network. This post explains, with a timely example, how our disruption contingency measures simply are not cutting it! Bonus content courtesy senior officials in LTA and SMRT who refused to utter a certain word that carried the severity of the situation.
#2 Fixing the LRT — Bukit Panjang (1155 views, Jun 2024)
The Bukit Panjang APM, a perennial favourite for transit enthusiasts to take constant slam dunks on. Four years after the initial post about the Sengkang-Punggol APM (I feel that could be a lot better done though…), here’s the final post on a possible solution to fix the woes of the BPAPM. If you haven’t already read it, the spoiler I’m giving is that part of this line deserves much better than just a mere APM.
#3 How not to talk about transit (1044 views, Oct 2024)‘
Three weeks after the nasty derailment in September, Parliament sits to discuss follow-up actions and future plans to steady the public transport network against potential risks. Well, that’s what they were supposed to do, but the responses that came from our key transport ministers belied a lack of understanding about how transport works, and a shockingly un-empathetic assertion in response to parliamentary inquiry. A deep analysis of two speeches made in Parliament that day, dissecting everything about transportation that our ministers don’t seem to understand.
#4 BCM — Of Contradictions and Contractions (1018 views, 2nd edition published Jun 2024)
First published in November 2020 as a rant against BCM (then for the Sembawang-Yishun Bus Package’s award), this post was re-written to be a general criticism of the gross cost contracting model, which frameworks like the BCM operate on. To put it shortly, BCM represents a regression from the quasi-nationalised duopoly that preceded it, and the parties that made the decision to transition our bus network to a semi-privativsed, fragmented system should be rightfully called out for this grave mistake. There’s just some things which the neoliberal capitalist dogma of “competition” simply do not apply to, and public transportation is one of them.
#5 More isn’t better (936 views, Mar 2024)
With three doors being the standard for all incoming bus purchases, the very important question we should ask ourselves is the purpose behind designing our buses in certain ways. Unfortunately, LTA’s reasoning does not align with their actions. An investigation into what drives the recent three-door ideology for bus procurements.
#6 Shameless! (872 views, Feb 2024)
Also related to our Transport Minister Chee Hong Tat, and also related to Parliamentary queries, here’s a revelation of his attitude towards public transport, highlighted through an exchange with an opposition politician concerned about bus service in his ward. Of course, the Straits Times doesn’t help by getting the facts around bus amendment procedures completely on their head! I’m still impressed by the revolting concoction from mixing shoddy writing with an incredibly toxic pile of manipulative language, to this day.
#7 I may have been wrong — and an announcement (861 views, Feb 2024)
When I made a prediction about an additional candidate for rationalisation in 2023, it turned out to not materialise. My bad. Here’s a re-interpretation of that manipulative PTC poster, and what it could potentially mean in the context of future rationalisation exercises. Also, we formally announced the start of guest posting here, and I’m happy that this call was not made in vain, as you’ll see later.
#8 More than just numbers (781 views, Jun 2024)
In collaboration with @flareonthecutest, here’s the proposed STC revamp of the various forms of electronic signage on our buses!
#9 Basics — Feeders (718 views, Mar 2024)
Let’s dive into the world of feeder bus services locally, and how they fit into the bigger picture of the overall bus network, be it as part of LTA’s hub-and-spoke ideology, or just the need to extend coverage to areas unfeasible to serve with other route types! Since 1978, feeders have been part and parcel of the bus system here, and it’s here to stay, in some form or another.
#10 BTOs and bus lane mania (685 views, Aug 2024)
In August, LTA removed a bus lane in Tampines North, which prompted an online tussle between those lamenting the loss of bus priority, and residents who appeared far happier about it. The core problem? Public transport wasn’t well-established from day one for these new estates, leading their resident demographic to be more pro-car.
Two more almost made it to the top 10, but were pushed out of the spotlight by the derailment in September:
#11 Do you really mean what you say? (677 views, Aug 2024)
The Bus Connectivity Enhancement Programme (BCEP) was launched in July 2024, promising improvements to bus “connectivity”, and lavish official promotion as the next big thing to reverse bus decline. Will that really be the case though? From the initial promotional materials, and as later developments in 2024 have shown, the drummed-up hype for BCEP is much too overrated. It’ll be interesting to see how the BCEP plays out in the new year, as it starts cannibalising the established trunk bus network out of necessity.
#12 What a single image tells you (663 views, Jun 2024)
What was originally trivial chatter in the Discord server turned out to reveal much about our public transport network structure, as well as the officially-provided tools used to guide first-timers around. Bayshore to Changi Airport via Bayfront, anybody?
Honourable Mention: The town by the seaside (guest post) (225 views, Dec 2024)
This year, we’ve also received our first guest post submission, in the form of an extremely detailed (beyond our imagination too!) four-part review of public transportation in Marine Parade. The first two parts are up and running on the link above, and we will update when our guest post contributors send us the next two parts. It’s worth a read, despite its length, because for what they’re worth, one really feels their frustration with subpar transport planning day in, day out, in the walls of text.
More stats to crunch, as the numbers get bigger. A total of 40,561 visitors left a total of 102,396 views on the site in the year of 2024. These are staggering numbers, and thank you to all readers (and bots?) for your support over the years. It’s surreal watching STC grow too, and this really wouldn’t be possible without all of you. While we’re at it, our Discord server now has 260 members, of which 230 are readers too! :>
The BIG Announcement
As we step into 2025, it’s also time to let our readers in on what we’ve been up to. In some earlier posts, you may have noticed us making reference to a “Transport Manifesto” in the works, to exist as an alternative vision for future land transport in Singapore to the official Land Transport Master Plan (earlier posts indicated a 2040 timeframe, whereas more recent ones have been targeting for 2050). Ever since the early days of STC, it’s something that I’ve been wanting to push out, but never really found the traction to do so.
Now, I’m glad to announce that STC’s Transport Manifesto 2050 is finally underway, with works having begun earlier in July 2024. The Manifesto, also known as TM50, will be our grassroots alternative to LTA’s LTMP 2050, which is likely to release in 2025 too. This is a vision of land transport that will cater to the needs of an increasingly diverse Singapore, while staying true to the principles of an equitable, fast, accessible and liberating transport system.
TM50 is a comprehensive manifesto that encompasses all aspects of land transport. It’s not just written about the various modes, or issues about transportation here. It’s a manifesto written by the people who ride the trains, take the buses, drive on roads, cycle on paths, and walk on the pavements that span the Lion City. And we want you, a fellow traveller in our city, to join us, as we embark on this monumental journey towards better journeys in future. The sky is not our limit — let’s aim for the stars, and far beyond!
The Manifesto covers a wide range of affairs in land transport, and will be highly transformative in establishing a greener, more liveable and people-centric urban ecosystem within the Garden in the City. By 2050, all of Singapore is your oyster — get everything you need within 30 minutes, and anywhere within 60 minutes, all without a car. Yes, that includes Lim Chu Kang too. Heck, why stop there — access your favourite off-road destinations in Singapore’s hinterlands and Johor in 90 minutes too, if you want!
What’s in the package? Of course, there’s the usual suspects — a dazzling interpretation of our rail network by 2050, set to double in network length from the 360km promised in LTMP 2013, offering new connections to upcoming towns of the future. The bus network is also being reviewed, with proven tools of this century being used to provide faster, and more reliable bus services, at little extra cost. Don’t call it a rationalisation exercise — the sorry service reductions of the early 2020s have no place here!
Let’s revolutionise cycling too. What’s better than just spilling bits of paint on the sidewalk? A coherent network, enabling seamless journeys. Of course, never forget the origin of it all — the human, for whom the city is built for. How different can new spaces in upcoming greenfield areas be built, to make them better oriented for their human inhabitants? Lots, and we invite you to glimpse various future towns built for their residents and visitors, not their vehicles. From Long Island to PLAB and the Greater Southern Waterfront, the possibilities are endless in such vast spaces, to roam around and imagine the next chapter of the Singapore story in.
The Manifesto will also rethink the way we think about various forms of transportation. Policies that have held back sustainable development will have to go. It’s high time we also include the industry in this too. How should the various players in our transport scene come together, enabling better mobility for tomorrow? Let’s transform urban transportation here, for our 6 million people who get around, day in day out.
No matter who you are, everybody has something to gain from our Manifesto. Step into a better future with us! As part of the process, we will also be launching the TM50 website in the first week or so of 2025, so do stay tuned! 😀
When the Manifesto is launched later in 2025, besides being an expression of grassroots interest for a more inclusive transportation system, many of these novel initiatives can, and hopefully will serve as inspiration to LTA and MOT for how we can transform the transport sector, the integral part of Singaporeans’ daily lives. A “world-class transport system” isn’t a mere slogan. Let’s step above and beyond, to achieve the best of all worlds. May the new year be the start of a long series of wonderful transformations for decades to come, and let’s see where we are come 2050.
Once again, a heartfelt thank you to the STC community for a splendid 2024, and see you around in 2025! Team STC, signing off.
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Hi fellow readers! Exactly 1 year ago, I was inspired by the 2024 New Year’s post to join the STC Discord server. 1 year later, I’ve joined the ranks of the Team as a collaborator, working on TM50 together with AMC, averagematcha and a few Readers. If any of you are still hesitant on joining the STC server (like I was last year), just do it! You won’t regret the friendly and engaging community we have here. At STC, your opinions are valid (as long as you’re civil about it), and each member makes our community ever more vibrant.
2024’s been a rough year for Singapore’s PT sector, with numerous bus crashes and the longest train breakdown we’ve ever seen. But good things have happened, such as the openings of TEL4 and Punggol Coast, as well as the launch of new CDS services (with debatable effectiveness tho). Now that 2025 is here, it’s time to put the last year behind us, and look to what this year will offer!
~zeyeeter
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Hello readers! And a happy new year! Sorry for such a prolonged period of AFKness.
With another year gone, the STC has reached yet more milestones we couldn’t have without everyone’s support. And I am damn proud of what this server has achieved, in terms of productivity or advocacy in continuing the STC’s core goals.
And with that, I wish everyone a happy new year! Oh and a happy CNY in advance 😛
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Hello dear readers! It’s been a while since I last posted back in 2022… I hope to at least get one more article out by 2025 lol. STC has definitely come a long way and I hope to continue to journey with all of you as 2024 comes to a close.
Cheers for the New Year! 😀
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I may be two days late, but better than never I guess.
Anyway, a very happy new year to all STC readers! I haven’t been posting much here but for those in the STC Discord server who are especially observant, they might have noticed that I have included the title “Aviation Correspondent” in my display name.
You read that right, I’ll be helping with STC’s expansion into covering aviation. Singapore’s aviation landscape hasn’t seen much in the way of incidents but what has been changing is how our beloved Changi Airport operates!
This is going to be quite the jump since the primary focus of this blog has, and until now, been land transport, diving into new government initiatives reading into the fine print and flagging out potentially misleading claims about the future of transport. Obviously, expanding this blog by writing about another industry requires more resources. Therefore, I’ll be working with AMC regarding a major problem we’ve had as more articles are written; media storage space. Currently, the free plan on WordPress is a measly 1 GB for new websites, but for legacy blogs like ours, we can maintain the original 3 GB threshold which we have already exceeded.
What can you expect from STC in the future? The current plan I’ve drafted includes monthly updates on the local aviation landscape (Being a student in aviation management, this might just help me boost my resume material heheh), with some commentary on foreign happenings which might affect Singapore’s transport situation as well. This is not so much of a “transport critique” segment but more of a reportage format.
With that being said, here’s to an amazing 2025! (It’s the square of 45 after all)
Author’s Note: For anyone waiting for this year’s edition of the crowd-rush articles, there won’t be any since I was deployed at Changi Airport that day. It’ll probably be back in 2026 though! (I heard that a train stalled after the celebrations ended, at least I didn’t have to pay for a Grab ride home…)
@ridecycleshoot (rcs.sg)
Interested in building a better future for Singapore’s transport? Join the STC community on Discord today!
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