An old new world: the old train depot at Sentul

I love an old space, especially one in which one finds a character that speaks very loudly of its past. It seems increasingly difficult to find one, especially as the pace seems to have quickened when it comes to repurposing old spaces to remain relevant in the present and for the future. Many, having been redeployed in a meaningful way, seem to lose the essence of what they were in the effort to keep them up to speed with the demands of modern world. It was thus quite a refreshing for me to step into three wonderful examples of repurposed spaces that remain a portal into the past in a short span of less than a fortnight — the first being Sentul Depot, which is across the causeway in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur.

Tiffin at the Yard at Sentul Depot, which is quite an instagrammable place to visit.

Old train maintenance yards always have a certain appeal for me and in them one finds many tales of the past and structures with much character. Stepping into the one at Sentul, which has partially been repurposed by a private developer as an arts and lifestyle destination, brought to mind the yard we once had in Singapore that had been part of the former railway complex at Tanjong Pagar. It is certainly a shame that the yard in Singapore or at least part of it, could not be retained and transformed in a similar way.

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Workshops and maintenance sheds of the former railway yard at Tanjong Pagar seen in 2011
(since demolished)

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The siting the depot at Sentul, originally named Central Railway Workshops, can be traced back to the formation of the Federated Malay States Railways (FMSR). The railway administration made a decision to house its huge build and maintenance complex in the area in 1902. The location, just three miles out of town along Batu Road, offered several advantages, chief among which was its position relative to both the main line running through the administrative centre of Selangor and the FMS, and to the Batu Caves. The Batu Caves were where the granite quarries that were exploited to provide railway ballast could be obtained from. A branch line was built to serve the workshop complex — described as “eclipsing anything of the sort in the East” — could also be extended to the quarries.

The entrance to Tiffin at the Yard at Sentul Depot

Construction on the Sentul complex began in 1903 and the workshops were fully operational by August 1906. The complex featured “huge blocks of buildings ” that housed stores, engine and carriage working sheds, running sheds, factories and foundries with a shed that was observed to be 38 feet (~11.6 metres) by 150 feet (~45.7 metres) wide. The complex was able to handle the working of up to 700 miles (1126.5 km) of open line. There were also quarters built for the engineers, supervisory staff, and also coolies (workmen) — quite a number of whom were members of the Tamil community.

Tiffin at the Yard at Sentul Depot

USAAF Raid on Sentul, 1945

Much of the yard and workshops would be destroyed by bombing during the latter stages of the Japanese Occupation. An obvious target for bombing raids made by the United States Army Air Force (USAAF), well over 60 per cent of the yard and workshop area, which covered an area of some 5.7 hectares, was destroyed in early 1945. This forced the Japanese to move and disperse the railway works further afield. Following the end of the war, a huge effort was undertaken to clear the wreckage left by the air raids. The major part of the rehabilitation effort was completed only at the end of 1952, some seven years after the end of the war, having been delayed by the communist insurgency. During this time, the site became known as the Sentul Works (or Workshops).

A view of one of the disused sheds.

Sentul Works, which employed a workforce of five thousand at its height, remained in use until the the early 2000s and was decommissioned in 2009 (although KTM — the successor of the FMSR and later Malayan Railway maintains an EMU Depot next to it). The complex has since been bought up a a private developer YTL, and is in the process of being redeveloped. Among the attractions housed within the Sentul Depot complex is Tiffin at the Yard, which provides an opportunity not just to visit the former railway works, but also to dine in it.

Tiffin at the Yard at Sentul Depot

Lost Places: the Killiney Road railway bridge

Wouldn’t it be cool to have paraphernalia related to a conventional railway line in the Orchard Road area, such as the now well-known girder bridge that ran over Orchard Road, still in existence today? It may come as a surprise but the bridge was actually one of two bridges that were in very close proximity to one another, with a similar girder bridge running across Killiney Road following on the Orchard Road bridge in the direction of the Singapore and from 1907, Tank Road Station.

The railway bridge at Killiney Road.

From the Killiney Road bridge, the line – part of the 1903 Singapore Government Railway or Singapore to Kranji Railway, took ran down an incline towards the Oxley Road and then curving towards Tank Road level crossing and then towards Singapore Station. The line was extended towards the port and Pasir Panjang in 1907 forcing the shift of the station at the triangular clearing where the National Theatre once stood to Tank Road proper. The line would be absorbed into the Federated Malay States Railway (FMSR) in 1913. In 1932, a deviation turned the line from the Bukit Timah area towards Tanjong Pagar Railway Station.

The road bridge at Neil Road – a remnant from the 1907 extension of the Singapore Government Railway.

Speaking of the extension, there is in fact a remnant of this extension – a road bridge at Neil Road that was built to carry the road over the railway which ran through what is today Duxton Plain Park and some of this, as well as the stations along the old Singapore and Kranji Railway is discussed here in this History’s Mysteries episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1HStrNMxxE.

Parting glances: Tanjong Pagar Railway Station as it will never again be

The time has come to say goodbye, albeit a temporary one, to another old friend. The former Tanjong Pagar Railway Station is set to be closed come the new year so that the extension of the Circle Line MRT and the construction of a MRT station can go on beneath it. If all goes well, it will only be reopened in 2025, by which time it will have a feel that will be very different  that which has existed at the station through the grand art-deco inspired station’s 84 year history.

The famous façade of the station features four triumphal figures sculptured by Angelo Vannetti of the Raoul Bigazzi Studios in Florence that represent the then four pillars of the Malayan economy.

The former station holds the memories of many. The railway’s mostly Malaysian staff still speak fondly of their days in what has to be one of the grander stations to serve along the Malayan railway. There also are the memories of the numerous passengers who passed through its especially grand vaulted main hall; many depended on the railway not just for forays across the causeway, but also as a well used link for the thousands who commuted from the homes in southern Johor to Singapore for their work and even to attend school.

Murals decorate the main hall. The hall also features two booths made of teak wood that have since been painted over.

A view of the main hall without the clutter of the last days.

As part of the Request for Proposals (RFP) to develop a concept plan for the Rail Corridor, which was returned to Singapore on 1 July 2011, a concept design was sought for the adaptive reuse of the former station for an interim period of 20 years. During this period, the nearby port facility the station had been positioned to serve, will make a westward move, following which plans for the Greater Southern Waterfront, into which the former station will be incorporated, will be firmed up.

The end of the line. This year is the last year we get to take in this perspective. It is one that has greeted three generations of travellers coming by train to Singapore for some 79 years before the closure of the railway at the end of June 2011.

The completion of the Circle Line also dovetails into this and the tunnels for the line will run directly under the station to minimise the potential for uneven ground settlement and the risk of damage to the precious structure of the National Monument. A MRT station, Cantonment Station (its working name), is also being built under a part of the station’s platforms. For this, sections of the platforms, which had apparently been assembled in a modular manner, will be removed and stored to allow excavation work to be carried out for the MRT stations’s construction. The intention will be to reinstate the removed platform sections and refurbish them after the work for the MRT station is completed.

Gaps in the station’s platforms, said to be amongst the longest in the Malayan Railway’s stations, point to where the modular sections come together.

One of the things that is apparently being looked at by the winning team for the RFP’s adaptive reuse of the former station, is how, besides the use of the station as a gateway into the Rail Corridor as a community space, is the integration of the MRT station under its platforms into it. This may see an additional MRT station entrance between the platforms that will see traffic of passengers of the new train line over the platforms and through the former station’s main building.

An impression of the MRT station’s entrance between the platforms produced by MKPL. New platforms are shown in this impression as it was initially thought that the sections of the platforms in way of the MRT station would have to be demolished to allow excavation work.

The reverse view of the proposed MRT station’s entrance between the platforms. A canopy over it will be one of the interventions that will be necessary (MKPL).

While this may necessitate several interventions that will alter the feel the former station once provided, it will be a rather meaningful outcome for the former railway station that in the words of the winning team MKPL Architects Pte Ltd and Turenscape International Ltd, will have “the former station, connecting Singapore’s past, present and future”. Another thing being looked at is the beautifying of the space fronting the station currently used as a car park as a “Station Green” – a landscaped garden intended to allow a better appreciation of the station’s grand façade.

MKPL/Turenscape proposes to replace the car park, currently in front of the former station, with a landscaped garden.

For those who want to take a last look at the former station before it closes and is forever altered, only three opportunities possibly remain. These coincide with the anticipated open houses that will be held over the year’s three remaining public holidays. The last will be Christmas Day, a widely commemorated holiday that for the members of one of the larger religious communities here in Singapore, is one of promise. Built with a promise that could never be fulfilled, the grand old station will close after Christmas Day, with a new promise for its future.

The length of the platforms, said to be among the longest in the FMSR’s stations, were to accommodate the longest mail trains.

A look up what in the station’s last days, was the departure platform.

Immigration counters on the departure platform last used by Malaysian immigration officers. These will surely be removed.

One of two hydraulic stops at the end of the tracks – one was returned following the handover of the station.

Memories of teh tarik.

Rooms that were used by freight forwarders at the former station – these possibly will be converted for use by F&B or retail outlets in the future.

Another look into a freight forwarders’ storeroom.

A booth. Last used by the auxiliary police at the station, the booth had in its early days, been used by the convenience shop that operated at the station.

The inside of the former ticketing booth.

Beautiful soft light illuminates some of the rooms along the main hall.

A part of the platforms where one could watch the world go slowly by over a cup of teh tarik in the station’s last days.

Another view of the main hall. There are lots of stories related to the haunting of the third level (section under the letters FMSR at the far end), used previously by the Station Hotel.

The clutter of the main hall in the station’s last days.

The crowd witnessing Tanjong Pagar’s last moments as a station late on 30 June 2011.

Last journeys.

A final glance at the main hall.

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A look back at Tanjong Pagar Railway Station

Gazetted as a National Monument in its final days as the southern terminal of the Malayan Raliway, the former Tanjong Pagar Railway Station was built in 1932 as a centrepiece that would underline Singapore’s growing importance as an economic centre in the British Far East. Its position was carefully considered for its envisaged role as a gateway from the southernmost point in continental Asia to the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Sir Cecil Clementi the Governor of Singapore, in his address at the station’s opening on 2 May 1932, made the observation that it was “a natural junction between land-borne and sea-borne traffic”, adding that it was “where every facility will be afforded for interchange between railway and ocean shipping”.

It was a promise that was not to be fulfilled. Sir Cecil could not have predicted that the railway’s importance as a means of transportation in the Malayan peninsula would diminish and just a little over 79 years since the 5.1.5 pm arrival of the first train from Bukit Panjang Station, the whistle of the last train to depart was heard late into the night of 30 June 2011. An agreement between the governments of Singapore and Malaysia (who through the administration of the railway, also owned the station and the land on which the railway operated through Ordinance 22 of 1918 or the Singapore Railway Transfer Ordinance 1918), which had taken two decades to sort out, saw to the move of the railway’s terminal to Woodlands and with that the transfer ownership  the station and much of the railway land on the island to the Singapore government on 1 July 2011.

Since its closure, the station fell into disuse with the odd event held in the space, and in more recent times, a series of open houses held during public holidays. The location of the former station in what will become the Greater Southern Waterfront has put permanent plans for it on hold. A concept plan for an interim use is however being developed as part of the Rail Corridor RFP by a team led by MKPL Architects and landscape designers Turenscape International. An MRT station for the final stretch of the Circle Line is also being constructed under a section of the platforms, together with the line being run under the station. The work being carried out means that the former station closed to the public for a substantial period of time with the completion of the MRT scheduled for 2025.

The station found use after its closure as an event space.

The rush by the staff at the station to leave on the last train at the end of the final day of operations.

A final journey on the Malayan Railway on 30 June 2011.

A last breakfast on 30 June 2011.

A reflection on the convenience store and the main hall in the last days.

The very hardworking last Station Master at the station, En. Ayub.

The arrival platform with its meal time crowd.

Coming home.

The welcome. One of the first things that would greet passengers after mid 1998 when the Singapore CIQ was relocated to Woodlands. Prior to the move, it would have been necessary to pass through Singapore Immigration, Customs and a narrow fenced passageway where dogs (behind the fence) would sniff passengers for narcotics.

The wait for a loved one.

Watching the world go slowly by over a cup of teh tarik.

The departure gate.

Leaving on the 8am.

The walk to Spooner Road.

Platform end.

Saying goodbye.

A welcome home.

The very friendly En. Azmi. He was posted to the station on 1st July 1990 and completed a full 21 years of service at the station when it ceased operations on 30th June 2011.

Mr Mahmoodul Hasan, the M. Hasan in the name of the station’s makan place. He ran the station’s two canteens before its closure.

Catwalk – one of the many cats the station played host to.

A view down the platform.

The ticketing counter.

An all too common occurrence at the ticketing counter.

The last Eastern and Oriental Express train to depart.

The Ramly Burger stand. Food was one of the draws of the station.

The day the music died. 12.45 pm on 24 June 2011, when the last plate of Briyani from the popular Ali Nacha stall at the Tanjong Pagar Railway Station was served.

The arrival.

The festive crowd – when queues formed for tickets in the lead up to Chinese New Year. Many with roots in Malaysian would return by train to their home towns for the important holiday (photo source: National Archives online).

The main hall of the station in its early days. The station was built in 1932 to serve as a gateway to the oceans, through the wharves at Tanjong Pagar.  Its opening on 2 May 1932 was marked by the 5.15 pm arrival of a train from Bukit Panjang. The first the public saw of it however, was several months prior to this, when it was used for a Manufacturer’s Exhibition in January 1932.

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Bukit Timah Railway Station revisited

It was in the final days of the Malayan Railway’s operations through Singapore just over a year and a half ago that the former Bukit Timah Railway Station drew crowds it that had not previously seen before. The station, built in 1932 as part of the Railway Deviation which took the railway towards a new terminal close to the docks at Tanjong Pagar, was one that was long forgotten. Once where prized racehorses bound for the nearby Turf Club were offloaded, the station’s role had over time diminished. Its sole purpose had in the years leading up to its final moments been reduced to that of a point at which authority for the tracks north of the station to Woodlands and south of it to Tanjong Pagar was exchanged through a key token system. The practice was an archaic signalling practice that had been made necessary by the single track system on which the outbound and inbound trains shared. It had in its final days been the last point along the Malayan Railway at which the practice was still in use and added to the impression one always had of time leaving the station and its surroundings behind. It was for that sense of the old world, a world which if not for the railway might not have existed any more,  for which it had, in its calmer days, been a place where one could find an escape from the concrete world which in recent years was never far away. It was a world in which the sanity which often eludes the citizens of the concrete world could be rediscovered. It is a world, despite the green mesh fencing now reminding us of its place in the concrete world, which still offers that escape, albeit one which will no longer come with those little reminders of a time we otherwise might have long forgotten.

Scenes from the station’s gentler days

Fading memories

A year ago, Singapore was seeing the last days of the old Malayan Railway. The railway had served Singapore over a century, cutting a path through the island first with a line partly running on what is Dunearn Road today over to Tank Road. With the deviation of 1932, the line was set on its last path, turning at Bukit Timah to the docks at Tanjong Pagar. The line fell silent on the 1st of July and with that, all that was left were the physical reminders of the old railway and the collective memories we have of it.

The silence of the morning after a little over 79 years of operations at Bukit Timah Railway Station.

One year on, many of the physical reminders are no longer with us – most of the tracks and sleepers have since been removed and returned to Malaysia. The two station buildings have received conservation status – Tanjong Pagar Railway Station has been gazetted as National Monument and Bukit Timah Railway Station a conserved building. We do know that three other recognisable structures – the two truss bridges that define the Bukit Timah area and a girder bridge that many see as a gateway to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, will remain. There are several other smaller structures that we do see including the surviving signal huts at the various level crossings (the bright yellow one at Kranji Road fell victim to urgent road widening works soon after the 1st of July). It is unfortunate that several structures that still stand, were ones that have not been very well maintained when they were in use. As a result, most of the wooden structures are termite infested and are in rather poor shape. It does look as if, based on the signs that have been placed around the structures, that they may go the way of (if they haven’t already) the other physical reminders that since been removed.

The signal hut at the former Kranji Level Crossing was one of the first to go.

One which sees a “building unsafe” sign is the former Mandai (Stagmont Ring Road) Crossing’s signal hut. This would really be a shame – the hut bears an impromptu memorial on its door neatly scribbled in permanent market pen. Written on the door are the names of the last gatemen, presumably by one of them: Mr P Mohan A/L Ponniah, Mr Hamid B. Hashim and Rodwwan B. Mohd. Salleh. Below the names is a record of the passing of the last train at 2330 hours on the 30th of June noting that the train was driven by the Sultan of Johor as well as the years of the crossing’s operation (1932 – 2011).

The former signal hut of the Mandai Gate Crossing that is structurally unsound.

The memorial to the last gatemen and the last train.

With the removal of this signal hut, little will be left to physically remind me of this level crossing – just those few photographs, and the records and the memories that I have. And of all that I will miss of the old railway, it is the sight of the level crossings that I will most miss – seeing a train cross the road does serve as the earliest memory I have of the railway. As memories fade with the passing of time, it is this memory of the railway that I hope that I will hang on the longest to.

With the tracks and sleepers now removed, there is very little physically left to remind us of the railway.

The outhouse at the Mandai Crossing will also have to go.

Briyani no more …

The 24th of June saw the last day at Tanjong Pagar Railway Station of the ever popular Ali Nacha Briyani stall. At 11 am on the day a queue of at least 30 people could be seen snaking around the confined space of the M. Hasan Railway food Food Station by the main hall of the station. Some in the queue were seen to be ordering as much as 20 packets of briyani which resulted in the queue reaching lengths never seen before. By 12.45 pm, a green sign was put up to tell customers that the briyani was sold out, bringing an end to the chapter for the outlet at Tanjong Pagar Railway Station. Fans of the railway briyani may like to know that Ali Nacha would be starting a new chapter at Block 5, Tanjong Pagar Plaza, #02-04.

The media was all over the Ali Nacha Briyani stall, as the queue snaked around to the side of the station building.

The scene at 11.45 am ...

By 12.45 pm, the Briyani had been sold out, brining to an end a chapter for Ali Nacha at the Tanjong Pagar Railway Station.

A peek into the early days of Tanjong Pagar Railway Station

Tanjong Pagar Railway Station began its life in the fourth decade of the 20th Century, opening with a promise that it was to have been the southern point of a rail network that was to span the continent of Asia and connect to the then well established European rail systems. The vision was an ambitious one, a link would not only be created between Europe and the Far East through the railway, but it would also have the potential to reach across the Pacific and Indian Oceans via sea routes, with Singapore – already then a well established port, serving as the principal gateway.

The first act of the station, was however not as a terminal for the carriage of goods or to see the rush of passengers through its main hall. With the station’s main building close to completion at the end of 1931, it provided a venue for a Manufacturers’ Exhibition that opened on 2nd January 1932.

The exhibition was the first of its kind in Singapore. Coming at a time when the world was still suffering from the effects of the Great Depression, the exhibition purpose was to bring to light Singapore’s hitherto unheard of manufacturing potential. Providing local manufacturers with a platform to showcase their products and capabilities, the exhibition also helped to promote Singapore’s growing importance as a economic centre in the British Far East – with the very grand looking new station as its centrepiece.

The exhibition’s aim, stated in the official guide, had been “to present as many aspects as possible of actual and potential manufacture in Singapore”. Included amongst the exhibitors were companies that were to become household names in Singapore including the likes of Robinsons, John Littles, Malaya Publishing House (which was to later become known as MPH), Diethelm and the Straits Trading Company. Opened by the then Governor of Singapore, Sir Cecil Clementi, the exhibition also provided many members of the public with their first view of the internals of the main building of the new station.

The main building of the station was first used as a venue for the first Singapore Manufacturers’ Exhibition which opened on 2nd January 1932 (image source: Willis’ Singapore Guide, 1936).

The actual opening of the station to railway traffic wasn’t until some months later on the 2nd of May 1932. This was commemorated with the arrival of a passenger train, the first to pull into Tanjong Pagar. As reported by the Straits Times on 3rd May 1932, it “comprised of an engine and three saloons to travel over the new deviation”. Leaving Bukit Panjang Station at 4.30 pm, it carried a load of guests including the Governor, the Sultan of Perak and Mr J Strachan, the General Manager of the FMSR and arrived “punctually at 5.15”.

In his speech at the opening, Sir Clementi was to explain the motivation for building of a station of such a stature, saying:

We stand here at the southernmost tip of the continent of Asia; and, since the Johore Strait is now spanned by a causeway which was opened for traffic on June 28, 1924, we may even say that we stand at the southernmost top of the mainland of Asia. This point is, therefore, a real terminus as well as a natural junction between land-borne and sea-borne traffic; and it is very right that the terminal station of the Malayan railway system should be built at Singapore, the gateway between the Pacific and Indian Oceans and immediately opposite the Tanjong Pagar docks, where every facility will be afforded for interchange between railway and ocean shipping.

The Governor also added that he had “not the slightest doubt that, for centuries, this Singapore terminal station will stand here as one of the most nodal points in the whole world’s scheme of communications.”

While this, eight decades later, has not quite come true (although we are still talking about a Pan-Asian rail network) for the station, there is little to dispute Singapore position as a transport and communications node in the modern sense. The Governor could not of course have predicted the phenomenal growth that air transportation was to see at that point in time.

The location of the station, across from the docks at Tanjong Pagar, was deliberately selected so that the southern terminal of the what would have been an intercontinental overland railway network could be integrated with ocean shipping and extend the reach over the Pacific and Indian Oceans (image source: Willis’ Singapore Guide, 1936).

The station, one of many of Swan and McLaren’s masterpieces, even in its current state of disrepair, is a wonderful piece of architecture to marvel at and was described by an article in the 7th May 1932 edition of the Malayan Saturday Post as having a “palatial appearance”. Overshadowed by the towering blocks that have come up at its vicinity,an elevated road, and buildings and containers stacked high at  the docks it was meant to feed, it does however take a bit of effort to take in the station’s grand appearance.

A feature of the grand building that is very noticeable is the entrance arches,which are flanked by four triumphal figures. The work of sculptor Angelo Vannetti from the Raoul Bigazzi Studios Florence, they stand guard over all who pass through the arches and into the station’s grand vaulted hallway. Described as “lofty and cool” in the same article, the main hall extends three storeys or some 21.6 metres above the visitor, providing a “sufficient pocket of air” to allow the hall to be kept cool in what even then must have been the oppressive tropical heat. It is this lobby that impresses the most. Six sets of mosaic panels, designed to resemble batik paintings, catch the visitor’s attention immediately.

The main vaulted hall of the station in its early days. An impressive integration of architecture and public art. The lamps and the clock seen in this picture – has long since disappeared, but the hall remains, even in the state the station building is in today, a particularly impressive piece of architectural work. Caption reads ‘Booking Hall, Singapore Station’ (image source: Willis’ Singapore Guide, 1936).

There is a lot more clutter in the hall today … the lamps and the clock we see in the hall in the station’s early days are also missing.

The Willis’ Singapore Guide (1936), gives us an idea of Tanjong Pagar and the operations of the FMS Railway from the station in and  around the time of the station’s opening. It describes the FMSR as running from Singapore for 580 miles to Padang Besar. There it meets the Royal State Railways of Siam.The FMSR also incorporated a 121¼ miles of the Johore State Railway, which was leased to it.

As is the case today, the East Coast Line branched off at Gemas and extended to the port of Tumpat some 465 miles from Singapore. A short branch line connected the line there with the Siamese Railways at Sungei Golok.

We are also told of a branch line connecting Port Swettenham (now Port Klang) with branches also serving other ports along the west coast of Peninsula Malaya. These were at Malacca, Port Dickson, Teluk Anson and Port Weld.

A total of 1321 miles of metre gauge tracks were laid, providing some 1067 miles of track mileage. The guide also provided information on the daily schedule of trains from Singapore to Penang, with a day and night express service run daily. It would then have taken some 22 hours to reach Penang from Singapore and some 9 hours (which doesn’t seem much different from the journey these days) to reach Kuala Lumpur.

The journey in the 1930s to Kuala Lumpur took some 9 hours.

The express train services in 1936 (source: Willis’ Singapore Guide, 1936)

On the evidence of the guide, which I suppose would for first class travel, the service provided does seem a lot more luxurious and comfortable as compared to what we’ve become accustomed to these days. As described by the guide, the Restaurant Car served “an excellent breakfast, luncheon or dinner”, at a “reasonable price”.

Sleeping Saloons with two berth cabins were provided on the night trains (as they are now) and a “commodious Buffet Parlour Car is attached to the night express trains between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur”. Breakfast, tiffin and tea baskets were also available at the principal stations. This could be ordered en route with the “Guard of the trains or any Station Master” who would have been able to “telegraph free of charge”.

Once the last train pulls out of Tanjong Pagar Station, it would bring to an end a little over 79 years of operation of a station that was to see centuries as one of the ‘most nodal points in the whole world’s scheme of communications’.

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The information contained in this post has been put together from various newspaper articles and as well as the Willis’ Singapore Guide 1936, to provide a glimpse into the early days of Tanjong Pagar Railway Station.

More information on the station and its architecture can be found on a previous post: “A final look at Tanjong Pagar Station“.

I also have a collection of experiences and memories of the railway in Singapore and of my journeys through the grand old station and if you care to read about them, do drop by my page “Journeys through Tanjong Pagar“.

Also, if you are keen to find out and support the Nature Society’s (Singapore) proposal to retain the green areas that have been preserved by the existence of the railway through Singapore and maintain it as a Green Corridor, do drop by the Green Corridor’s website and show your support by liking the Green Corridor’s Facebook page. I do also have a series of posts on the Green Corridor if that is of interest – please visit them at “Support the Green Corridor“.

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A final look at Tanjong Pagar Station

Together with a group of yesterday.sg fans, I had another look around Tanjong Pagar Railway Station, on a 45 minute tour run by the Preservation of Monuments Board (PMB), to provide participants with a better appreciation of Singapore’s latest National Monument, before operations end on the 1st of July this year. Besides meeting with yesterday.sg’s Shaun Wong, from whom I learnt that the inspiration for the name of the website was the Beatles song “Yesterday”, I also had the pleasure of meeting fellow blogger P.Y. of Oceanskies, who incidentally has provided a comprehensive account of the tour, and Belinda Tan who I am grateful to for stirring up quite a fair bit of interest in my blog by posting links to my set of railway memories. The short but informative tour was led by a PMB volunteer, Rosanne, who provided a fair bit of information on the background to the station, the reasons for its establishment and the choice of location. What interested me in particular, was the information that related to the station’s architecture, which provided me with a better appreciation of the station.

I had the opportunity to join a PMB tour of Tanjong Pagar Railway Station courtesy of yesterday.sg.

The station we were told by Rosanne, was built to provide a grand station that was to be the terminal of what the British had envisaged as a intercontinental transport network that was to span from Singapore at the southern tip of the Asian continent to the British Isles. The choice of the location close to the docks at Tanjong Pagar signaled the ambitious extent of the British Empire’s intent in expanding transport and communication links between the British Isles with Asia and further afield, with Singapore’s strategic location being seen as the gateway (by sea) to the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Designed by Swan and MacLaren, the station is thought to have been designed after Helsinki’s Central Station and sharing elements with Washington D. C.’s Union Station. The style of architecture, Art Deco, that was selected was one that it was felt combined both Western and Eastern elements and influences. Art Deco is in fact very much in evidence around the station – geometric patterns in the details of the ceiling and arches of the portico an example. Another example of the Art Deco style that is evident is use of triumphal figures in the form of the four Angelo Vannetti sculptures at the façade that represent the four pillars of the Malayan economy, being Agriculture, Commerce, Transport and Industry. Our attention was also drawn to portions of the roof which featured a green tile structure inspired by the roofs of Chinese Temples.

Transport, one of the four pillars of the Malayan economy is seen carrying a stone block, with a wheel behind, stepping on a bow of a ship. The use of triumphal figures is common in Art Deco architecture

The Chinese temple inspired green tiled part of the station's roof.

Lions on the window details at the station's side are meant to represent Singapore.

Inside the hall, our attention was drawn to the six sets of batik style mosaic mural panels which feature some 9000 tiles that represent the economies of the Federated Malay States (FMS), as well as to the two crests – one being the crest of the Federated Malay States – which comprised of the four British protected states of Selangor, Perak, Negeri Sembilan and Pahang, and the Straits Settlements. Closer inspection of the coat of arms reveals a shield that is coloured with a colour from each of the four state flags in the case of the FMS, and in the case of the Straits Settlements, the shield is made up of four quadrants each representative of the three settlements, Penang, Malacca and Singapore, and also Christmas Island which was annexed to the Straits Settlements in 1889. The station when it was built was designed to maximise the comfort, particularly of first and second class passengers embarking on what was to be a long journey (Rosanne mentioned it took something like 29 hours to reach the Siamese border by train from Tanjong Pagar and the Japanese during the occupation, improved the speed of the passenger trains to 60 km/h and goods trains to 50 km/h, cutting the journey time by some 5 hours), equipped with amenities such as passenger waiting rooms, refreshment rooms, dining rooms, a hairdresser’s shop, dressing rooms and lavatories. Based on news reports of the opening of the station, we are also told that there were other rooms such as a telegraph office, parcel room, offices for the necessary station staff and included a few bedrooms.

Batik painting style mosaic mural panels in the main hall depict the economies of the FMS.

The coat-of-arms of the Federated Malay States - the shield features colours of the four protected states of the FMS.

The coat-of-arms of the Straits Settlements with each quadrant of the shield representing the each of the Straits Settlements which then also included the Indian Ocean territory of Christmas Island.

The 45 minute tour ended at the start of the departure platform which now features immigration counters introduced after the separation of Singapore from Malaysia, when travel across the Johor Straits required a passport. When I first started taking the trains in the 1990s, we would have to pass through the Singapore Immigration counters at the near end before going through Malaysian Immigration and Customs further down the platform … this practice was discontinued from mid 1998 when Singapore shifted its immigration to the CIQ Complex in Woodlands, insisting that the Malaysian authorities do the same. This has been resisted right up until today – and up to the 30th of June, one of the things you can still do is to enter Malaysia before leaving Singapore (for a more detailed explanation on this please read my previous post “A final journey from Tanjong Pagar: into Malaysia before leaving Singapore“. The platforms we were also told were some 1,200 feet long, built to cater to the longest of mail trains. We were also shown some of the features around the platform of historical value that would be retained – this included the hydraulic buffer stops at the end which apparently are the only ones found in the stations operated by the Malaysn Railway. The tour ended with a little excitement – first from the animated voiced coming from Malaysian immigration officers who tried to tell us we had strayed a little too far along the platform. It was then time for a quick catch up over some teh-tarik at the cafeteria with my fellow participants and new found friends ….

What used to be immigration counters used by the Singapore authorities ... and apparently reclaimed by Malaysia since mid 1998 ...

A train on the departure platform - the platforms are 1,200 feet in length to accommodate the longest of the mail trains. We were also told that 3rd Class passengers had to use a side access to the platforms.

One of the two hydraulic buffers.

The roof over the platforms also show art deco features in the geometric patterns found on them.

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For a comprehensive account of the tour, do drop by PY’s post “The Tanjong Pagar Railway Station Tour on 21 May 2011“. And if any of you are keen to hop onto the last train into Singapore and have a party … do drop by Notabilia’s post “All Aboard? Party on the Last Train Through Singapore” and indicate your interest there. I also have a collection of experiences and memories of the railway in Singapore and of my journeys through the grand old station and if you care to read about them, do drop by my page “Journeys through Tanjong Pagar“. Lastly, if you are keen to find out and support the Nature Society’s (Singapore) proposal to retain the green areas that have been preserved by the existence of the railway through Singapore and maintain it as a Green Corridor, do drop by the Green Corridor’s website and show your support by liking the Green Corridor’s Facebook page … I do also have a series of posts on the Green Corridor if that is of interest – please visit them at “Support the Green Corridor“.

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Rosanne, the volunteer guide with the PMD who led the tour.

A last look at the station ....

Capturing memories and the station's last days of the station seems to be very much fashion these days.

A colourful journey in black and white

I have always been one for train rides, taking one every opportunity I get whenever I find myself with time to spare, be it from the grand stations of the great European cities, or from stations closer to home, with a particular liking for the old style railways that I sometimes stumble upon. In Singapore, the opportunity had presented itself throughout my life I guess, but somehow, I never embarked on a journey from the grand old station at Tanjong Pagar until I was well into my adulthood, making many trips in the 1990s. Trains always present themselves as a convenient means to get around from one city to another, taking one from the centre of the city right into the heart of another. So it is with the Malayan Railway as well – for another few months at least when Keretapi Tanah Melayu Berhad (KTMB or KTM) moves the terminal station from Tanjong Pagar to Woodlands. With that, we will bid goodbye to the old railway lines which has served Singapore since the turn of the last century, as well as an old railway station in the heart of the city.

The last opportunity to take a train from an old style station in the heart of Singapore, on a line that has served Singapore since 1932 (parts of it date back to the turn of the last century), through Singapore's countryside, before train services terminate at Woodlands by the time the 1st of July arrives.

As mentioned in my previous post, I took another ride recently, just for the sake of reliving my previous journeys before the chance to do so evaporates once KTM moves operations to Woodlands. It will be a shame not to have had that experience, one that involves arriving or departing from the platforms which had served as the southern terminal to the Malayan Railway for eight decades from its days as the FMSR. Once the move is made, Singapore would lose not just another historical link it has had with the Malay States in the Malayan Peninsula, but also a proper train station to take a romantic journey on a train from. What will also go are the well worn tracks that served us so well, laid over a corridor of land that probably due to the railway, has remained untouched and relatively green; as well as the many markers left behind by the railway including the railway bridges, signal posts, railway buildings and control huts, distance markers and the last remaining level crossings in Singapore.

The platforms that have served as the southern terminal point of the Malayan Railway for eight decades.

The choice of the destination for the journey, was one that involved a short trip to one of the main towns in the southern Malaysian State of Johore which borders Singapore, some 90 kilometres north. The town is close enough for a slow paced day trip, and close enough that train tickets to and from are sold as “shuttle” or commuter train tickets available 24 hours prior to the journey. Kluang, along with the destination of my previous outing, Gemas, featured prominently in the final push through Malaya by the Japanese invading forces and was General Yamashita’s headquarters during the dark days at the end of January 1942. It had been a place that I knew about since the early days of my childhood being a town which my grandmother disappeared to leaving me without the stories she would relate to me as a young boy for a weekend.

The platform at Kempas Baru.

Container carriages at Kempas Baru Station.

Passengers boarding the train at Kulai Station.

Train rides, especially through the stations along the Johore length of the railway and walkabouts in Malaysian towns can be very colourful experiences, so much so that they sometimes distract one from the old world charm of the journey and the towns. I thought it would be nice to show another side of the journey and Kluang itself without colour as the images would capture a mood that would otherwise be lost in full colour.

The gentle rocking of the train gives the carriages a sleepy feel ...

A passenger at the end of the carriage.

The conductor.

Arriving at Kluang Station.

Kluang Station.

Kluang itself presents itself as a sleepy town, with the station being perhaps one of the busier places in the town, coming alive as passengers and well wishers gather on the platforms. The station itself hosts an institution in the town, a coffee shop, the Kluang Rail Coffee, that seems to be the star attraction of the town.

Kluang Station is the location of a well known and well patronised coffee shop.

The five foot way of a row of shophouses along Jalan Station.

A closed gate of a shop.

Kluang is a destination for photographers.

The town has an old world feel that maybe could have been that of the Singapore of half a century ago. Beyond its sleepy façade, the town does present some interesting finds. We stumbled upon an old Chinese medicine shop in a row of old shophouses along Jalan Mersing with seedy looking second storey hotels served by well worn wooden staircases, which we later learnt were places one would find ladies of the night. At then end of the row was a coffee shop which had some wonderful tasting treats and quite good coffee, and it was on the recommendation of a passer-by that we made a pit stop there, observing that the tables and floor of the old coffee shop were much cleaner than what we had become accustomed to in Singapore where tables are often cleaned with a swipe of an oily rag.

Not one of the staircases with a seedy destination.

The proprietor of the Chinese Medicine Shop.

Cabinets at the Chinese Medicine Shop.

Tools of the trade (at a Chinese Medicine Shop which has been at its location on Jalan Mersing since the 1950s).

The coffee shop along Jalan Mersing.

The beef noodle seller.

Won Tan Mee man.

Coffee Powder seller.

The slow pace of life extends to the coffee shop.

Leaving the coffee shop, we stepped out into a pretty hot day, which thankfully wasn’t accompanied by much humidity. Still that perhaps made the lazy stroll through town even lazier, and the first chance we got, we stepped into a modern shopping centre and the reward of some bubble tea, right across from a herbal tea vendor on his tricycle. The bubble tea outlet was crawling with customers as was the fast food outlet inside the shopping centre, leaving the streets outside deserted and somewhat forlorn.

A streetside tailor.

Typical street in Kluang.

From the shopping centre, we decided to visit the church that my grandmother visited all those years back – a plaque confirming that Archbishop Olcomendy of Malacca and Singapore (a throw back to the pre-independence archdiocesan boundaries that once existed), had consecrated the church in 1964. The airy little church at the end of Jalan Omar near the station is reminiscent of some of the village churches that once existed in Singapore and is simple in form and architecture.

Church of St. Louis, built in 1964.

Stained glass inside the Church of St. Louis.

Pews inside the church.

It was a short walk to the station next, to sit down at the much touted Railway Coffee shop. It was packed when we arrived just after it opened again at 2 pm, leaving us with a little wait … It was more for the atmosphere that sitting in that old cafe in an old railway station that might have been built in the early 1900s provided than maybe the fare the coffee shop offered. Soon, it was time to take the journey back … another one into Tanjong Pagar, where food stalls that remind us of days gone would soon be seeing their final days. Even if it is not for the train ride it is still worth a visit to the station to visit the makan stalls for chances are when the station finds a second life it might be where only the well heeled would dine. To top a visit to what is still very much a part of Malaysia as is the railway line, why not have something at the station that has become synonymous with street fare across the Causeway … a greasy but very tasty Ramly burger.

Like much of the world we live in ... old is being replaced by the new.

Back at Kluang Station.

Passengers waiting at the platform.

Another scene at the station.

Inside the Kluang Rail Coffee shop.

Having a conversation over a cup of coffee inside the Kluang Rail Coffee shop.

The busiest part of town?

On the 1543 shuttle into Tanjong Pagar ...

A locomotive.

The train ride provides an opportunity to catch up on some sleep.

A last chance to grab a Ramly burger at Tanjong Pagar ...

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To read my series of posts on Journeys through Tanjong Pagar, please click on this link.

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There I go again … another journey through Tanjong Pagar

I guess I have not had enough of it, despite probably having tens of, if not a couple of hundred journeys out of Tanjong Pagar. I did it once again, since proclaiming that that journey taken with some friends at the end of last year would possibly have been my last. Having had a mixed bag of experiences on the many journeys through the arches of the grand old station, the ones that probably I remember most of are the regular delays that one comes to expect on the far from reliable train service that KTMB operates. Part of the reason for this, some of the archaic infrastructure and practices still in use on the old railway, does perhaps lend itself to an experience that you would certainly not get on the efficient railways that criss-cross much of the European continent – one that seems out of place in the ultra modern and efficient world we have grown accustomed to in Singapore.

I will certainly miss taking train journeys out of Tanjong Pagar ... something that will perhaps motivate me to take a few more over the next few months before the station closes.

Stepping into the station itself would somehow take you back in time, the atmosphere being one which seems more at home in the Singapore of the 1960s and 1970s. The large airy concourse that greets the visitor is adorned with mosaic murals that speak of a style that was prevalent of a time we have left behind and depict scenes from the Malayan peninsula that would have been more common in that era. Over the years that I had have an awareness of the layout of the concourse, nothing much has changed except perhaps that the occupants of some of the spaces, and an invasion of a Tourism Malaysia hut in the middle of it. It is in one of the spaces along the concourse that some nice food can be found and to perhaps add a old world flavour to the station, you would find food vendors that would be more comfortable conversing in Bahasa Melayu, once a common language on the streets.

The sight of the trains at the platforms of Tanjong Pagar will soon be nothing but a fading memory.

Beyond the concourse, the platforms do also take one back in time. With a cafe where one can sit back and enjoy the comings and goings on the tracks as well as on the platforms, over a cup of tea that perhaps one would bear only for the pleasure of what the setting offers. These days with the knowledge that the station would soon hear its last train whistle, one would encounter an army of photographers that sometimes seem to outnumber passengers making their way from the platform. Across on the departure platform, for long missing the Singapore checkpoint staff that had occupied the rooms at the end for some three decades before moving to Woodlands during a time when relations between Singapore and the northern neighbours wasn’t at its best. Somehow, the frenzy that accompanies the checkpoint on the Causeway is also missing from the Malaysian Customs and Immigration counters on the platform.

Last light ... the light is fading on the train station as it will hear its last train whistle by the time the first of July comes around.

Beyond the platforms, the highlight for any train passenger awaits, one that takes one through parts of Singapore that have remained untarnished by the waves of development that has altered the face of much of the island, and it is for this that a train journey through Tanjong Pagar is certainly worth the while. The initial part of the journey through to the Bukit Timah area past the two truss bridges cuts through some parts that might well have remained untouched since the Railway Deviation of 1932 took the railway line through the Ulu Pandan area to Tanjong Pagar. There are huge tracts of greenery, particularly in the Buona Vista / Portsdown and Ulu Pandan areas, much of which are certainly worth keeping – something that the Nature Society of Singapore advocates in their proposal to turn the rail corridor into green corridors. Unfortunately, it does seem like the vultures have started to hover over some of these places based on the Foreign Minister’s mention of plans during the budget debate on 3 Mar 2011. Beyond the station at Bukit Timah, there would also be parts where the original Singapore to Kranji line would have run up to 1932. And it is along these stretch that we see some of the parts of the railway that fascinated me from my early days, including the bridges and the level crossings that we might soon see the last of, as come the first of July, the railway line that we have seen cut through Singapore for a century or so, would see its last train.

Foreign Minister George Yeo on the schedule for the shift of the terminal station from Tanjong Pagar by 1 Jul 2011. Nothing new in the announcement except that some of the development plans for the railway land were mentioned.

The departure platform again. Not having had enough of journeys through Tanjong Pagar, I found myself on the platform taking another journey.

So, there I found myself on a Sunday morning with a few companions, boarding another train, to embark on what is perhaps not a final but one of my last journeys out of the station, taking it all in again. The view from the train pulling out from the sunrise shrouded station was dreamy to say the least, as were the views of the train yard, somehow feeling as if it was a movie of a forgotten time that I was watching. I took it all in … signal poles, distance markers, the green tracts, the Tanglin Halt area which I had been familiar with having spent my earliest days in nearby Commonwealth Crescent, that old station at Bukit Timah, the truss bridges and the level crossings. The train ride went a little too smoothly for it to be one that I was used to, leaving right on time and speeding past the station at Bukit Timah and skipping the ritual of the exchange of the key token. We were to find out why once we got across the Causeway … that I would leave to another post, as I will our destination for the day … this journey certainly won’t be my last and if I do have the time … it would be one of a series of journeys that would be to remember that we once had an old world railway line running through a Singapore that had long left that old world behind.

Pulling out of Tanjong Pagar.

Light Signals ...

Signal pole.

A fading memory ... the view out of the window of a train passing through Kranji area.

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To read my series of posts on Journeys through Tanjong Pagar, please click on this link.

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The other road named after the memory of Charles Edwin Spooner

Just as Spooner Road in Singapore is a world apart from the rest of Singapore in many ways, I recently discovered that the other road that was named after Charles Edwin Spooner that still exists is a world apart in many ways from the rest of the city it is set in. This Spooner Road, or Jalan Spooner as it is now known as, together with the Spooner Road in Singapore, were two out of three Spooner Roads that were named after Spooner who was the first General Manager of the FMS Railways (FMSR) who began his career in the Public Wokrs Department in Selangor before his appointment to the FMSR in 1901 (the third on Federal Hill in Kuala Lumpur I discovered had been renamed as Jalan Cenderawasih). It was during his time at the PWD in Selangor that he oversaw and influenced some of the Moorish styled architectural masterpieces of Kuala Lumpur, swaying the style from the Neo Classical Renaissance style that was a standard of British government architecture in the colonies towards one that was influence by Islamic elements for the Malaysian capital.

Spooner Road or Jalan Spooner in Ipoh is another named after the first General Manager of the FMS Railways, C. E. Spooner, and associated with housing for railway workers, as is the Spooner Road in Singapore.

With some time to spare after a stroll through parts of old Ipoh, where I was reacquainted with the genius of Arthur Benison Hubback in the form of the wonderful Railway Station and Town Hall on New Year’s Eve, I decided to take a drive with the help of an Asus Garmin A10 GPS mobile phone that I am reviewing over to a quieter part of town where Jalan Spooner was located. Jalan Spooner is a road that has in its past been long associated with housing railway workers as the Spooner Road in Singapore is, and it was for that that I had sought to find evidence on. Taking a right turn as directed correctly by the GPS off Jalan Sungai Pari not far from the railway tracks, it was a road sign and a sign that indicated the existence of a village “Kampung Spooner” that greeted me, followed by a sense of extreme desolation. For some reason I had that feeling that I was driving into the fifth dimension which might have well been accompanied by the theme music from the TV Series “The Twilight Zone”, as the I stared through my windscreen towards a the eerily silent stretch of road that lay ahead surrounded by the greenery that lined both sides of the narrow country-like road. The road ahead seemed even more eerie when the sight of a lone woman walking down the road up ahead came into view. She looked as if she was almost floating as she made her way up the long and lonely road that lay ahead.

As is the Spooner Road in Singapore, the one in Ipoh looks as if time has left it behind.

As it is with Singapore’s Spooner Road, driving down the road also gave an impression that it was a place where time had stood still, particularly when the first few signs of civilisation down the road came into view. A few wooden houses stood on the right, with a few signs of life: a boy wearing a clinical mask playing outside his home and a barking dog up the metalled driveway of the road that led to another house. On the right there was an old wooden shophouse that was shuttered, and a motor workshop with a few motorcycles parked in front.

Housing around Jalan Spooner.

A resident of Jalan Spooner.

A shophouse at Jalan Spooner.

A motor workshop along Jalan Spooner.

It was on the right of the road that a cluster of dilapidated buildings came into view – the style of which was similar to the many railway buildings that are found on the tracts of land along the railway corridor in Singapore, particularly around some of the level crossings such as the ones in the Bukit Timah and Kranji areas – probably a testament to the period of the Malayan Railway’s development when they were built. Close inspection of a red sign that was posted in front of one row of buildings naming the “Perbandanan Aset Keretapi” (Railway Assets Corporation) giving evidence of their previous use. There it was – the evidence that I was looking for – and with that I had established the connection between the two Spooner Roads, separated not just by the creation of two very different nations out of the British administered Malayan States and the former colony of Singapore, but also by a distance of some 600 kilometres along the railway track, and unified by its association with not just the illustrious C. E. Spooner, but also with providing housing for the workers of the Malayan Railway.

The former railway workers' quarters at Jalan Spooner - now in dilapidated state.

A sign providing evidence of the ownership of the land on which the dilapidated buildings stand, naming the Railway Assets Corporation (Perbadanan Aset Keretapi) as the land title holder and warning that trespassers would be prosecuted.

More dilapidated buildings that once housed Railway workers.

Another view of Jalan Spooner.

Architectural masterpieces of KL: The Railway Administration Building

These days most would associate Kuala Lumpur, the Malaysian capital, affectionately referred to as KL, with some of the modern landmarks that have risen in a city that itself rose out of the confluence of the muddy Gombak and the Klang Rivers. KL is a city that I have been very fond of, visiting it on an annual basis since the 1970s when it took six hours on the old trunk road in the back of my father’s car. It is a city that I have long associated with food and shopping, usually ending up staying in budget accommodation off the main shopping belt of Bukit Bintang which also gave access to the wonderful street food in the Jalan Alor and Tong Shin Terrace areas.

Kuala Lumpur features some magnificent architectural masterpieces from the turn of the 20th Century including the Railway Administration Building which was completed in 1917, which is sadly now overshadowed by the new icons such as the Petronas Twin Towers.

It wasn’t until perhaps the 1990s that I started to notice some of the wonderful architectural masterpieces from the turn of the 20th Century, having had the independence to wander around some of its streets, such as the beautiful Sultan Abdul Samad building and Masjid Jamek, and using the trains as a means to travel to KL, who could not but notice the Kuala Lumpur Railway Station and the magnificent Railway Administration Building just across Jalan Sultan Hishamuddin from the station.

One architectural masterpeice, the KL Railway Station, seen through the arches of another, the Railway Administration Building (now the KTMB HQ) across Jalan Sultan Hishamuddin. Both buildings feature Morrish influences and were designed by A.B. Hubback.

With much of the focus on the new icons of KL, less attention is now placed on these mainly Moorish architecture inspired buildings – the work of the Public Works Department, the PWD (which was incidentally led by the very able Mr Charles Edwin Spooner at the end of 19th Century, before he was appointed the General Manager of the FMS Railways in 1901 – thus having a hand in the Railway Buildings as well). The Masjid Jamek, as well as the two Railway Buildings built in the early part of the 20th Century were designed by an architect with the PWD, a Arthur Benison Hubback, who incidentally rose to the rank of Brigadier General in the British Army during the First World War, and had the good fortune of working under the architect of Sultan Abdul Samad Building, Arthur Charles Alfred Norman. Besides being responsible for some of the iconic architecture of KL Hubback also was responsible for works such as the Ipoh Railway Station and work in the sister colony of Hong Kong, the most notable work being the terminal station of the Kowloon to Canton Railway at Tsim Sha Tsui (which sadly was demolished in 1977, leaving only the Clock Tower, which now serves as a landmark in Tsim Sha Tsui, behind).

The former Kowloon Railway seen during construction in 1914. It was demolished in 1977 with only the Clock Tower, now a landmark in Tsim Sha Tsui, remaining. The station was designed by an architect with the Selangor PWD, A.B. Hubback who was responsible for some of the iconic buildings of Kuala Lumpur (source Wikipedia).

Tsim Sha Tsui's historic clock tower (1915) ... the last remnant of the Kowloon Railway Station.

The Railway Administration Building, now the Headquarters of KTM Berhad (KTMB), has been one that I had longed to visit for a long time, but somehow never got to in all those years passing through the Railway Station. It was one that I would always hold in awe, with its age browned façade dominated by moorish styled arches and domes. Based on the information plaque at the entrance to the compound, the building is a “fine example of Moorish architecture reflecting the Ottoman and Moghul glory of the 13th and 14th Centuries blended with Gothic and ancient Greek designs of the 14th Century. The ground floor is adorned with 97 large frontal Gothic arches and 4 smaller arches. The high and wide verandahs skirting the building create a cooling effect and are suitable for the constant high climatic temperatures in Malaysia. The first floor has 94 large arched windows of Gothic design and 4 circular arches of smaller size. The second floor has 171 Gothic arches and 4 large and 12 smaller circular arches. Five domes sit majestically on top of the building, each surrounded at four corners entwined columns. They are of orthodox Greek design typical in the 14th century. This historical building suffered serious damage twice in its lifetime, firstly during the Second World War when its North wing was bombed and secondly when the same wing on the second floor was gutted by fire in 14 November 1968.”

The moorish inspired age-browned façade and the main central dome of the Railway Administration Building in KL.

Another view of the age-browned façade of the Railway Administration Building through one of the arches.

Stepping into the building for the very first time, I could not but be amazed by the sheer splendour of its Moorish inspired design. As the information plaque rightly describes the verandas, they are indeed cool and airy, and dominated by a wonderful row of Gothic styled arches that brings to mind those of the interiors of some of the magnificent Gothic cathedrals and churches of Europe and perhaps the Mosque of the Caliphs in Cordoba and to an extent CHIJMES in Singapore. Unfortunately, the upper floors of the building are out of bounds, being where the offices of KTMB are located and my exploration of the building was confined to the ground floor. One of the features that can be appreciated from the ground floor at the main entrance lobby of the building is the beautiful central staircase which spirals below the central dome of the building, featuring some wonderful wrought iron work on its banisters for which a visit to the building is certainly worthy of. If you are ever in KL, do take the time to visit this magnificent building, one that is often passed over for some of the more modern icons of a city that is in fact blessed with some wonderful architectural masterpieces, particularly those given by those highly talented colonial architects who played a big part in the infrastructure development not just of KL but in some of the other British colonies at the turn of the 20th century.

The central staircase below the central dome provides access to the upper floors of the building (which is out of bounds).

The central staircase.

A photograph in the hallway showing the building and the railway station.

The building also features some beautiful ironwork.

A window seen through one of the frontal arches.

A view across Jalan Sultan Hishamuddin through one of the arches.

Magnificent gothic arches from the exterior corridors of the building.

A view of the Gothic arched corridor at the back of the building.

A broken part of the buildings cornice lying at the side of the building.

A view of the staircase at the wing of the building.

A semi-circular flight of steps at the wing of the building.

An old signal post on display at the front of the building.

The frontal arches.

In the gardens in front of the building.

The Malaysian Settlement in Singapore and the memory of Charles Edwin Spooner

There is an obscure little corner of Singapore which many do not notice, nestled between Kampong Bahru Road and the railway yard that stretches to Keppel Road. Stepping into the area, you could quite easily forget that you are still in Singapore except for the two blocks of flats that resemble our own blocks of public housing built by the HDB in the mid 1970s, as you will be overcome by a feeling of stepping into a different world. It is a different world in many ways, being part of the land which is owned by the Malaysian State Railway, KTMB, and very much a part of the lost world within the KTM Railway Land that with the agreement between the Singapore and Malaysian Governments to redevelop the land in place, that will probably be consumed by modernity which has relentlessly swept across much of the island in the last three decades.

A lost world exists in Kampong Bahru ...

Access to the area is via Spooner Road, a name strange enough to have caught enough of my attention when I was in school to remember that I had a schoolmate (who I wasn’t really close to), who we referred to as ‘Spooner’ (for obvious reasons), who for some reason resided in one of the flats there. The flats of course, sitting on KTM land, belongs to the Railway, as much as the train yard and the Running Bungalow that sits at the entrance to the area on Spooner Road. I am not too certain when the current two blocks of flats were put up. Judging from the style of the blocks, it would have probably been around the mid 1970s, but they were definitely there at the end of the 1970s when I was in school with ‘Spooner’. The Running Bungalow itself was built in the early 1930s, part of the effort that has given us the magnificent Tanjong Pagar Railway Station and the Railway Deviation of 1932 that provided the Bukit Timah area with some of its distinctive character. Before the current blocks of flats, there had been the Perak and Selangor flats which had served as the quarters of the Railway Workers in Singapore.

Access to the lost world is via Spooner Road, off Kampong Bahru Road.

The Running Bungalow was built in the early 1930s together with the Tanjong Pagar Railway Station.

A reflection of the Running Bungalow in a puddle of water on Spooner Road.

View of Spooner Road, the Running Bungalow and the KTM Flats.

While the redevelopment of what must be rather valuable land in an area that is on the fringe of the CBD is probably inevitable, I do harbour some hope that the road, Spooner Road, or at least the name of the road is preserved in some way. The road is named after none other than Mr Charles Edwin Spooner, who came over as a State Engineer with the Public Works Department (PWD) in Selangor after a stint with the PWD in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). Among the projects that he oversaw and possibly influenced being in charge of the Selangor PWD was the construction of the wondrous and iconic Moorish styled Sultan Abdul Samad building which many now identify Kuala Lumpur with. In 1901, Spooner was appointed as the first General Manager of the FMS Railways (FMSR) and in that capacity oversaw the rapid expansion of the predecessors to what became the Malayan Railway, including the construction of the 120 mile long Johore State Railways linking Gemas to Johor Baharu, and the magnificent station building in Kuala Lumpur, which was completed a year after Spooner’s untimely death in 1909. It was after Mr Spooner, that not only saw a Spooner Road named after him in Singapore, but one associated with the Railways in Kuala Lumpur (I am not sure if this exists anymore) and also in Ipoh (which is now named Jalan Spooner). And it is for all his achievements, spending a better part of his life in the improvement of the colonies both in Ceylon and Malaya that we owe Mr Spooner at least a place in our own history and for our future generations not only to honour the memory of Charles Edwin Spooner, but also to serve as a memory of the Railway line that once ran through Singapore.

Some residents of Spooner Road enjoying the lifestyle I had growing up ....

Another resident of Spooner Road.

The lost world of Spooner Road. There was a Spooner Road in Kuala Lumpur and one in Ipoh (which is now Jalan Spooner) as well.

More views around the flats:

Lifts at the block of flats at Spooner Road.

Enjoying a ride around Spooner Road.

Laundry pole supports...

Window louvres ...

More window louvres ...

The land on which Spooner Road and the building sit are very much Malaysian owned.

More views around the Railway Yard:

Views around the train yard ...

[This post is also featured on Trains and Boats and Planes and One° North Explorers.]

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[For more posts related to the Railway Land in Singapore, the Shift of the KTM station from Tanjong Pagar to Woodlands, and of Train Journeys on KTM, please click on this link.]

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A final journey from Tanjong Pagar: destination Gemas

On what could be a final train journey out of Tanjong Pagar before the big move of the terminal station to Woodlands by 1 July 2011 for my friends and me, we decided on the sleepy town of Gemas as a destination possibly for two reasons. The first was that it was probably apt that feeling nostalgic for the railway line which has run through Singapore for more than a century, the bulk of what we see today being a result of a Railway Deviation that gave us that quaint old station at Bukit Timah and the grand old station at Tanjong Pagar, we explore what is the main railway junction on the Malayan Peninsula at Gemas from where the northbound lines branch off to the east and west. Gemas has in fact always been a town that has long been associated with the railway, with its station for a long time boasting an old steam locomotive, the 56 class MR No. 564.36 “Temerloh” which we had thought was still there. The second was of course that it was probably the furthest point on the railway that a day trip afforded, being approximately four hours from Singapore, allowing us to catch the 0800 Ekspress Rakyat out, arriving around noon, and the evening 1705 Ekspress Rakyat back into Singapore, leaving us with five hours or so to explore the sleepy town and maybe visit the World War II heritage site where Australian Forces had ambushed invading Japanese forces at a bridge over the Gemencheh River.

Gemas is the main railway junction in the Malayan Peninsula where the north bound lines split into an eastern line and a western line and probably the furthest point which could fit into a daytrip.

Gemas is a sleepy town built around the Railway Junction which is made up mainly of pre-war shophouses.

Arriving at the station, a little worn and a lot hungry from the journey which took one and a half hours longer than what was scheduled I guess the first thing was to head for a bite. We did just that, stopping at a coffee shop where we had not so quick and not so tasty a bite. From that it was on to the site of the Gemencheh Bridge – what is known as the Sungai Kelamah Memorial some 11 kilometres fron the station before heading back into town where we had a little over and hour to walk around.

Arriving at Gemas Station ...

A kilometre marker (what we might once have called a milestone), indicating the centre of Gemas town close to the Railway Station.

Where we had lunch ...

Old style bamboo blinds.

Naturally, our first stop after getting back into town was the train station, where we were disappointed to discover that the Termeloh had found a new home – having moved to the Railway Museum in Kuala Lumpur earlier this year as part of the 125 anniversary of KTMB. Still it was worth paying the station a visit – with another old locomotive and some railway relics from the past adding a feel of the old world station that Gemas once was. It was nice to observe the comings and goings as well … realising that passengers would rather cross over the tracks than use the overhead bridge that provided safe access to the platforms across from the main station building. A funny moment occurred when one of us had decided to venture up into the cabin of a working locomotive – where in trying to take a few photographs, he somehow blasted the horn, sending the station master scrambling out (probably awakening him from his mid-afternoon slumber) of the station control room.

The station was the first stop after getting back ...

The working locomotive on which one of my friends had inadvertently blasted the horn waking the station master from his mid-afternoon slumber.

Views around the station.

The town itself isn’t too interesting – most of the main part of town which can be covered by a ten minute walk, comprising of pre-war shop houses and that being a Sunday, most of the shops were shuttered. Still it was worth a walk around, the attraction I guess being two old Peranakan houses which I had somehow missed which some of my friends found. Being a hot day, we decided on the next best thing with there being not much to keep us occupied – sitting in the only air-conditioned premises in town – the town’s only fast food restaurant KFC – which was just a stone’s throw away from the station.

More views around Gemas Station.

A pre-war shophouse near the station.

More of the sleepy town that Gemas is ...

A resident of Gemas ...

Back at the station, it was time to stock up on a few conical shaped packets of the famous Gemas Railway Station Nasi Lemak, but not before being distracted by a couple deck out in their finery, having wedding photographs taken. Waiting on the platform, with packets of Nasi Lemak – one Ringgit each and in each warm paper packet that was warm to touch, inside it an old style simple serving of sambal ikan bilis, a quarter of a boiled egg and a slice of cucumber – just nice for a snack rather than a meal, there was much besides the wedding couple to observe. As anticipated the train was late getting in – arriving half and hour later than scheduled. Once onboard we could settle down at last – first was to taste the much talked about coconut laden rice waiting in the brown paper packets … the only thing can probably describe it is “Shiok!” – maybe that was brought about by the monotony and tiredness of the end of a journey that came with the end of the day. Dozing off regularly to the gentle cajoling of the train in the gentle swaying motion that comes as it rode over the tracks, we soon found ourselves back across the causeway and soon in Singapore, where the familiar sights of cars stopping at Choa Chu Kang Road for the train and then the glow of the steeple of St. Joseph’s Church along Bukit Timah Road told us we were home. Once at Tanjong Pagar station (an hour late) – where in my previous journeys it would have meant a rush to get through immigration, we could now stroll towards the station hall with us clearing immigration at the CIQ complex in Woodlands. Before we made our way home – it was a customary stop for food – we had satay. The station had always for me been a place that was synonymous with food … from my early days when the lights of the many hawkers in the carpark illuminated the grey building to the days when we could sit by the station building along Spottiswoode Park Road and dine al-fresco over satay … Then, with a quick final goodbye … it was back home … with fond memories of the many train journeys from the grand old station to carry with us.

A couple having wedding photographs taken at the station ...

Running for his bride ...

Around Gemas Station while waiting for the train to arrive ...

Passengers crossing the tracks ...

Gemas Station is as sleepy as the town ...

The wedding couple making their way down the platform ...

Boarding the train back ....

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A final journey from Tanjong Pagar: the slow train up the length of Johore

Leaving JB Sentral Station, the train on which we were on for what would probably be the last train journey out of Tanjong Pagar for my friends and me, continued on its journey north. It was a journey that in its early stages, had already been delayed by the stops and starts at Bukit Timah Station and was as one should expect on the KTM trains, that would be delayed further en route to our destination, Gemas. Nevertheless, it was still very much worth the experience, not just for the fact that it would represent a last for me out of Tanjong Pagar, but to be able to have a leisurely glance at the interesting places en route. The route takes the train through much of the length of the state of Johore, passing town after town that can be read from the list of significant positions as they fell in reverse order, in the dark final days of the Battle of Malaya in early 1942, during which the relentless push by Japanese invasion forces towards Singapore during World War II, saw much of the area overrun in a matter of two weeks. Our intended destination, Gemas, just north of the state border in Negri Sembilan, had in fact been where a significant battle took place, one that might, on another day, have turned the tide. That it did not, allowed the invading forces to reach Singapore’s doorstep some 16 days following the engagement in Gemas, with Singapore falling only a month after that engagement.

Time Table for the Ekspress Rakyat out of Singapore and back into Singapore ... the journey to Gemas takes a route through towns in Johore which read like a list of defensive positions taken up by the British forces as they retreated towards Singapore in the face of the Japanese invaders in the January of 1942.

Along the initial part of the journey from Johor Baharu, the unmistakable landscape that characterises much of the urban areas along the railway line was very much in evidence with zinc roofed huts that was once commonly seen lining many of the areas by the tracks in Singapore, lining parts of the tracks. One of the first stops along the way was Kulai, a town some 30 kilometres north of Johor Baharu which was one of the last areas to fall before the Japanese arrived at Johor Baharu on the final day of January in 1942. Kulai had previously been known to me from the road trips I made in my father’s car across the Causeway. It was one of the last towns we would arrive at on the long journeys back home before the final pit stop in Johore Baharu where we would always stop to do some final bits of shopping – particularly for school shoes at Bata (which were because of the rise in the Singapore Dollar against the Malaysian Ringgit in the early 1970s a lot cheaper in Malaysia than it was in Singapore). Later in life, I would associate Kulai with a friend, Paul, whom I met whilst attached to Sembawang Shipyard in the mid 1980s. He had come form Kulai to work at the shipyard, putting up in a tiny room in a wooden shack in the old Chong Pang Village on work days, returning to Kulai only on Saturday nights to visit his mother.

Squatters along the railway line north of JB Sentral - this was a common sight on the KTM Railway land in Singapore up to the 1990s.

Kulai - a town which featured in the march of the Japanese invading forces towards Singapore in January 1942.

Passengers alighting at Kulai Station.

A rail carriage at Kulai.

Rail carriage carrying containers.

Leaving Kulai Station.

Passenger holding a ticket up.

North of Kulai, the next major stop is at Kluang, some 90 kilometres from Singapore. Kluang also featured prominently in the push by the Japanses invading forces – being abandoned by the retreating British led forces to allow them to regroup further south in the face of the Japanese advance through Johore. Kluang was in fact where General Yamashita moved his headquarters to, from Kuala Lumpur, at the end of January 1942, as the forces under his command prepared for the final assault on Singapore. Kluang was also known to me in my childhood, not so much from the road trips, but as the town where my maternal grandmother paid a visit to on her only trip to Malaysia that she made without me that I could remember. She had spent a weekend there with a Catholic group on a pilgrimage at the end of the 1960s.

Passing a level crossing at Kluang.

Pulling into Kluang Station.

Kluang Railway Station is well known for its coffee shop which has even been recreated in places such as shopping centres in Kuala Lumpur.

The tracks at Kluang Station.

A scene along the tracks from Kluang to Paloh.

The view inside the Superior Class coach.

A young passenger ...

The next major stop, Segamat, was the last stop before arriving at Gemas. Before that, there was a stop to make at Paloh, a rather small town set amongst palm oil and rubber plantations – Sime Darby features prominently in the area. Paloh was, during much of the 1950s, caught up in the Malayan Emergency and being one of the notorious “black areas” where Communist activity was rife. Much of its notoriety came from ambushes and killings made by Communist insurgents operating in the area and it was only about ten years after the Emergency was declared that the area was re-designated as “white area”.

View opposite Paloh Station.

Arriving at Paloh.

Kilometre marker at Paloh.

KTM logo at Paloh Station.

View of the area along the way to Segamat.

View of the area along the way to Segamat.

View of the area along the way to Segamat.

1st view of Segamat.

Segamat was again another significant town during the war. It was where the Australian forces had retreated to after being forced back from Gemas. Segamat is of course well known to Singaporeans as being where some of the best durians originate from. My only previous encounters with Segamat had been once again on the many road trips made in the 1970s on the old trunk road leading up to Kuala Lumpur. Here the landscape around the station is dominated by warehouses and some old buildings associated with the railway, which we got a good view of as the train did a bit of backtracking after making its stop, southwards to the truss bridge south of the station, to move to another track and wait for a passing southbound train. This is a common feature in rail journeys through much of the southern part of the Malaysian railway as for most part, there is only a single track. This often makes the journeys longer than it should really be as trains often wait for each other to pass before being able to continue on their journey.

Pulling into Segamat Station.

View opposite the station.

Railway workers' quarters near Segamat Station.

Backtracking along the track to change tracks ...

On a truss bridge south of Segamat Station.

On a truss bridge south of Segamat Station.

Godowns near Segamat Station.

Godowns near Segamat Station and an old train carriage.

Segamat Station.

Another view of Segamat Station.

A member of the KTM staff walking along the train at Segamat Station.

Southbound train pulling into the station.

Southbound train passing a waiting northbound train. The line in the far south is a single track and trains often have to wait for one another to pass at some of the main stations such as Segamat - very often resulting in delays.

Southbound train heading towards the truss bridge.

View opposite Segamat Station.

Close up of a train's undercarriage.

A child looking out of the window of a passing train.

Leaving Segamat ... and on to our destination Gemas.

A companion is often necessary for the long and often delayed train journey.

After Gemas, it was our final push to Gemas. With a lot of stopping for passing trains that morning – it was only one and a half hours later than our scheduled arrival time of 1210, that we arrived at the station, somewhat weary from the journey, and somewhat hungry. Gemas, however was waiting to be discovered and we very quickly got off, found ourselves a place to eat, made arrangements for transport, and were ready for the next part of the adventure…

Arriving at Gemas Station.

Sign at Gemas Station ...

Gemas is the main railway junction in the Malayan Peninsula where the north bound lines split into an eastern line and a western line. The map shows the Singapore station in Tanjong Pagar, this would soon change when the terminal station moves to Woodlands.

A final journey from Tanjong Pagar: into Malaysia before leaving Singapore

Whatever our reasons may have been, some friends and I decided to embark on what may be a last journey by train from the station that has served as the southern terminal of the Malayan Railway, Tanjong Pagar Station, for a better part of a century. For some of us bitten by the nostalgia bug brought about by the knowledge that platforms of the station would have fallen silent by the time the second half of 2011 arrives for the grand old station, it was about reliving our fond memories of train journeys that we have taken through the station. For others, it was a maiden journey – one that needed to be taken before the station shuts its doors to train passengers for good, and one that needed to be taken for the romance perhaps of taking a train from a station that is very much from the old world.

The grand old station at Tanjong Pagar had served as the southern terminal of the Malayan Railway since 1932.

This thought of a last journey had come with a walk or discovery and rediscovery down the Bukit Timah railway corridor, and with little planning, a few friends decided on a day trip to Gemas, the significance of Gemas being that of the main railway junction where the lines running north split into eastbound and a westbound lines, a well as being about the furthest that one could go with the time afforded by a day trip. Having purchased tickets well in advance for the travelling party which had grown from a few friends to a party of 13, something that we decided would be best with the start of the peak travel season brought about by the school holidays on both sides of the Causeway, all that was left for us was to board the train when the day arrived.

The platforms at Tanjong Pagar would have fallen silent by the time the second half of 2011 arrives.

Going on what is the first train out to Gemas, the 0800 Ekspress Rakyat, meant an early start on a Sunday morning, having to arrive at half an hour prior to departure to clear Malaysian Immigration and Customs. Arriving at the station with time to spare, we were able to grab a quick bite at the coffee shop by the platform before making our way to the departure gates. At the gates, somewhat surrealistically, the frenzied atmosphere that had greeted my very first train journey was conspicuously absent, replaced by a calm that was certainly more in keeping with the laid back feel of the rest of the surroundings that early morning.

The was definitely a less frenzied atmosphere around the departure gates and platform compared to when I took my very first train journey out of Tanjong Pagar.

What had been up till 31 July 1998, the southernmost exit point from Singapore for journeys across the Causeway, the booths that were used by the Singapore Immigration Department before the big shift to the Customs, Immigration and Quarantine (CIQ) complex in Woodlands, now sit quietly and forgotten at the entrance to the platform. Beyond the booths lay ones that still had life, used by the Malaysian authorities, who have stubbornly resisted all attempts by the Singapore government to also shift the Malaysian checkpoint to Woodlands – one of what had been the many thorns that had been lodged in the side of bilateral relations between the two countries for a long time. With the Malaysian authorities continuing to operate their checkpoint at the station (claiming that it was well within their rights to do so despite the Singapore government’s insistence that it was illegal to do so on the grounds that whether or not KTM had a lease on the land, the land was still within Singapore’s sovereign territory), the checkpoint that we passed through is possibly the only one in the world that exists where the immigration clearance is carried out by the country into which entry is being made into first. What this also means is that passports are not stamped by the Malaysian side – an irregularity that is tolerated only as a consequence of train passengers leaving Tanjong Pagar station having technically not left Singapore, not having first cleared Singapore Immigration.

The booths that were once used by the Singapore Immigration prior to its shift to the CIQ complex at Woodlands on 1 Aug 1998.

A stamp on the Immigration Departure Card in lieu of one on the passport to indicate entry into Malaysia through Tanjong Pagar Station.

Passing through Malaysian Customs – I was quite relieved not to have encountered a particular Customs officer from the past, one whom most in the know would try to avoid back in the 1990s when every item of baggage would be rummaged through by the over zealous Customs officers stationed at Tanjong Pagar. The officer in question was one that stood out, being the only ethnic Chinese Customs officer amongst the mainly Malay officers, and one who seemed to think that everything that looked expensive or new had to be taxed.

The disused platform adjacent to the departure platform running parallel to Keppel Road.

An old passenger carriage at a disused platform at the station.

Finding myself on the very familiar departure platform after Customs, it somehow seemed a lot quieter than it had been on my previous journeys – perhaps with journeys by train becoming less attractive with Singaporeans heading up north, with the introduction of improved and very comfortable coach services to the major Malaysian towns and cities, which are not just much quicker, but also a cheaper alternative to the train.

The very silent departure platform.

Another view of the rather quiet departure platform.

Boarding the train brought with it familiar sights and smells ....

The train pulls out ... signalling its intent with a whistle and the blare of the horn ...

... as sways and jerks accompanied the first few metres of movement ...

The rustic charm of the train yard just after the station ...

More views around the train yard ...

There was a lot to take in along the way as well: once again, scenes that will be lost once the corridor through which the railway runs is redeveloped. Clearing the relatively built up areas as the train first passed the Bukit Merah and Delta areas, the bit of greenery around the Portsdown area before coming to Queenstown, Tanglin Halt and the Buona Vista areas, we soon found ourselves amidst the lush greenery of the Ulu Pandan area. The train pulled to a stop at Bukit Timah Station, not so much to pick passengers up but to make way for not one but two south bound trains, letting one pass before moving up the nearby railway bridge only to head back down to allow the second to pass. We were able to observe the handing over of the key token – an archaic safety practice where authority to proceed from the station would be “handed-over” by the station master to the train, before continuing on our journey north.

Pulling out through the Bukit Merah area ...

Pulling into Bukit Timah Station ...

Stopping for the first of two passing southbound trains ...

Crossing the truss bridge over Bukit Timah / Dunearn Roads ....

... probably to change tracks for the next passing train ...

Bukit Timah Station.

Signalling the second southbound train ...

Getting ready to hand over the key token ...

Getting ready to hand over the key token ...

Next, the train headed up the Bukit Timah corridor, past the first of the two distinctive truss bridges, through the notorious Rifle Range and Hillview areas before crossing the second of the bridges. Much of the area was certainly familiar from the recent trek some of us made down from the level crossing at Choa Chu Kang Road, which we in no time passed, crossing three more level crossings through some of the greener parts of the island before reaching Woodlands, where we disembarked to clear Singapore Immigration. Boarding the train, the jam on the Causeway soon greeted us, as well as a hazy and somewhat sleepy view of the Straits of Johore as we crossed the Causeway and rather uneventfully, we were soon at the spanking new Johor Baharu Sentral – just across from the old Johor Baharu Station, from where we would continue on the next part of our journey … northwards through the length State of Johore …

Through the Bukit Timah Corridor near Hillview.

Another view of the Bukit Timah Corridor near Hillview.

Enjoying the scenery of Singapore's nothern countryside near Kranji ... (don't try this at home!).

The sleepy view from the Causeway (looking at Senoko Power Station) of the Straits of Johore.

The water pipelines at the Causeway (supply of water was another thorn in the side of bilateral relations).

Arriving at spanking new JB Sentral ... the gateway to the north...

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Crossings through the passage of time

Writing about parts of the Malayan railway land in Singapore that I am familiar with has somehow fuelled a desire to discover parts that are less known to me, in an attempt to capture images from the railway line, parts of which would have gone back to the days of the Kranji-Singapore Railway in the early 1900s. Most of what we see today has in fact come about through the Railway Deviation of 1932 – one that gave us the two stations that we see standing today, Bukit Timah and the grand old dame at Tanjong Pagar, as well as some that have disappeared altogether. One of these in fact left its legacy behind, in the form of a name of an area – one that I have always had a fascination for, Tanglin Halt. As I have discovered on my walks of rediscovery through parts of the Bukit Timah corridor in which many of the railway “landmarks” I had become acquainted with on the many road and train journeys through the area are still around today, much of the land that the railway runs through look as if time in its passage through Singapore, has somehow passed by, leaving sights that belong in a landscape that we would have been more familiar with half a century ago.

Parts of Kranji Road, where the northernmost rail Level Crossing is in Singapore, looks very much as if time has passed it by.

On my more recent wanderings to parts that I am less familiar with, I was happy to see that time does seemed to have also stood still in many of the areas around, giving me as I strolled through them a sense that I was wandering through a world far removed in time and space from the big city Singapore has become. One of these wanderings took me to the north of the island to what are the three northernmost level crossings on the island, one of which is perhaps after the one at Choa Chu Kang Road, the busiest in Singapore, at Kranji Road. It is here that queues of vehicles form waiting not just for a train to cross, but due to the narrowness of the road lane where the crossing is, has the flow of vehicles across it restricted to one direction at a time. This along with the one I explored earlier at Gombak Drive and is one with that old fashion gate that gives a level crossing the character it should really have, and is close where an abandoned camp stands, skeletons of numerous Nissen Huts bearing testament to the forgotten era during which the camp would have been used. The road is in fact straddled by two former camps, the one on the other side appearing to be abandoned as well. Not being able to stop my car to explore the area on foot – I decided to move to the next crossing further south along Woodlands Road – at Sungei Kadut Avenue.

The northernmost rail Level Crossing in Singapore at Kranji Road. Traffic flow across the level crossing is regulated due to the narrowness of the road where the crossing is.

Skeletons of Nissen Huts at an abandoned camp along Kanji Road, in the vicinity of the Level Crossing bearing testament to a forgotten era during which the camp might have been used.

Another abandoned camp in the vicinity of the Level Crossing at Kranji Road.

The Sungei Kadut is today more known for the industrial estate which has been associated with sawmills and the woodworking and furniture industries since the 1970s. A mangrove swamp had in fact occupied much of the area where the industrial estate sits up to the end of the 1960s when the area was reclaimed to house concentrations of sawmills from areas such as Kallang, which were being relocated due to urban renewal. The crossing at Sungei Kadut Avenue seemed to be one of the more dangerous around for some reason – with a collision occuring between a train and a car in the mid 1970s when the gate keeper had failed to closed the gates at the crossing, in which the car driver somehow escaped injury.

The crossing at Sungei Kadut Avenue was where a train collided with a car in the mid 1970s.

The signal hut at the Sungei Kadut Level Crossing.

Abandoned houses belonging to KTM near the Sungei Kadut Level Crossing.

The refreshing rural scene around Sungei Kadut.

Further south along Woodlands Road, there is a smaller level crossing than the one at Sungie Kadut. This crossing is perhaps the prettiest level crossing in Singapore … with an old style signal hut set in a clearing off Stagmont Ring Road. The crossing is just about two kilometres north of the largest one at Choa Chu Kang Road, and one which I should have remembered from my days in National Service where I had a stint a a nearby camp which involved many exercises in the vicinity of the tracks, but somehow have no recollection of. What is interesting in the area is an old fashioned petrol station with an awning structure that suggests that it might not have changed very much over maybe two or three decades. There used to be a few of these along Woodlands Road – most had fallen victims to the widening of parts of the road. There is another old style station – an old Shell station nearby at Mandai Road – one that I would pass during my National Service days taking the bus service 171 towards Sembawang Road on the way back home from camp … I had a quick glance at it making my way down Woodlands Road and was happy to see that it was still there – signs of a recent makeover does tell me that it would be there for some time to come. Most of what we can see today in the area may soon be gone though, as once the terminal station for the southern end of the railway moves to Woodlands in mid 2011 – vast tracts of land which now belong to to the railway would be available for development and with that, we may see the last of the land that time forgot.

Stagmont Ring Road is where the prettiest level crossing is in Singapore.

The signal hut and level crossing at Stagmont Ring Road.

The crossing in operation ...

The outhouse at the level crossing.

The rural scene by the level crossing at Stagmont Ring Road.

Sights around the level crossing at Stagmont Ring Road.

An old fashioned petrol station along Woodlands Road near Stagmont Ring Road offers a feel of the countryside.

The final part of the walk down the Bukit Timah corridor: From the site of the Green Spot to a very green spot …

Wet and sticky from the exertions of a walk that had started early on a Sunday morning just as an electrical storm was developing, wet from the drenching we got and sticky from the humid air that was heated up by the sun’s appearance in the latter part of the morning, the eight of us started on the last leg of the trek from the site of the huge Green Spot bottle that stood at the entrance of the former Amoy Canning factory that most of those my age would well remember. From there, we trudged along Upper Bukit Timah Road to the entrance to Bukit Timah Nature Reserve on Hindhede Road where we came to a second steel girder bridge.

The narrow span girder bridge at Hindhede Road.

What we noticed of the bridge was that it, being of a much shorter span than the previous one we had encountered at Hillview Road, was supported by only two deep girders – which were quite clearly of riveted construction (rather than of welded construction – a method that is more commonly employed today), which provided some evidence that the girders have not been replaced since the bridge was first erected in 1932.

The bridge is supported by two deep girders which are riveted.

The view on top of the bridge at Hindhede Road.

Leaving the bridge, we decided to give an intended detour to the site of Beauty World a miss, moving on towards Jalan Anak Bukit, where we were greeted by the wonderful sight of the second of two White-Throated Kingfishers that we had seen that morning, perched on an extended branch of a tree over the tracks in the area.

The stretch of the tracks approaching the Anak Bukit area (looking northwards).

The second of two White-Throated Kingfishers that we spotted along the trek.

Taking a walk down down Jalan Anak Bukit, we turned into what must be quite an infamous shortcut across the railway track to Rifle Range Road, where there have been several fatal incidents over the years involving pedestrians taking the shortcut. Somehow, my earlier visit to the shortcut where I had, across a speeding train, caught a glimpse of a woman holding an umbrella on the other side of the track, seemed a lot more eerie than this one – perhaps because of the company I was in. The sight of the woman with the umbrella had brought to mind an incident at the end of the 1970s when an incident had occurred not far from shortcut, in which, a girl, last spotted holding an umbrella, had been run over by a train.

A train carrying bricks passing a popular shortcut from Jalan Anak Bukit to Rifle Range Road. The ghostly figure of the lady with the umbrella brings to mind an incident at the end of the 1970s in which a girl, last seen holding an umbrella, was run over by a train not far from the shortcut.

From the shortcut at Jalan Anak Bukit it was through familiar territory, haveing taken the same walk a few weeks back to rediscover the area around Bukit Timah Station. Taking the short walk down Rifle Range Road, past an abandoned factory building which we couldn’t decide if it might have once been part of the former Yeo Hiap Seng factory complex that stood on the wedge of land between Jalan Anak Bukit, Rifle Range Road and Dunearn Road, we soon came to the second of the two black truss bridges across the Bukit Timah area. From the bridge, it was a short walk to the quaint old Bukit Timah Station – which I have devoted a previous post to, still looking as I would always remember it. The station, we have been given to understand based on the recent Memorandum of Understanding signed between Singapore and Malaysia on the relocation of the Tanjong Pagar railway station to Woodlands by 1 July 2011, and the redevelopment of railway land, could possibly be conserved as well.

The abandoned factory building next to the track between Rifle Range Road and Jalan Anak Bukit.

The view of the railway land from Rifle Range Road.

The southern reach of the railway as seen through the truss bridge over Bukit Timah / Dunearn Roads - part of the deviation in 1932 that gave Singapore the grand old station at Tanjong Pagar.

The black truss bridge over Bukit Timah / Dunearn Roads as seen from Rifle Range Road.

Bukit Timah Station certainly has a rural Malaysian feel about it, surrounded by a sense of calm in very green surroundings.

The quarter kilometre marker at the station - the line will be slightly truncated with the shift of the main station to Woodlands by 1 July 2012.

Manually operated control levers for operation of railway points at Bukit Timah Sation.

The second part of the walk down the Bukit Timah corridor: The mysteries around Hillview

Leaving the compound of St. Joseph’s Church (Bukit Timah) with the sun peeking through the clouds, after a pause in our trek down Upper Bukit Timah Road, it was a good time to get reacquainted with the railway track side of the road. We crossed the overhead bridge which provided a wonderful vantage point from which I was able to take in the tremendous changes that the area, which lies in the shadow of Singapore’s tallest hill, Bukit Timah Hill, has seen over the three to four decades since I had first become acquainted with it. Somehow, it didn’t seem that long ago when I would view the area from the backseat of my father’s car en route to an adventure across the causeway or on a visit to the orchid nursery in the Teck Whye area which was run by a friend of my mother. There was a time as well – that would have been in the 1980s, when I did pass through the area on my own – on my way to a friend’s place up on Chestnut Drive, when the road was a lot narrower and the area around seemed a lot less built up.

The area where the tracks run opposite St. Joseph's Church.

After another pause at an area by the train tracks, accessible from the main road as what has become a popular short-cut had been trampled through the vegetation from Hillview Avenue, where we were able to have a wonderful view of what we could imagine of as a pass that was carved through a hill and where we were treated to a dash of bright blue in the form of a White-Throated Kingfisher perched on a branch of a tree by the tracks , we made our way south towards a building that had served for many years as a landmark in the area. The building is the Standard Chartered Bank branch building at the entrance to Hillview Road – a building from which I could count the number of bus stops to ensure I stopped at the correct one, on a side of the road that had once been devoid of any form of landmarks to identify where one was – especially in the dark of night. I would be always be reminded by my friend to stop at the second bus stop after seeing “Chartered Bank” – which had stood at the same spot – almost unchanged since it was first opened in April 1957.

A view of the "pass" near Hillview Avenue.

The tracks, looking north, near the shortcut to Hillview Avenue.

The Chartered Bank, a popularly referred to landmark in the area, as it looks today.

The Chartered Bank branch building at Bukit Timah seen at its opening on 6 April 1957 (source: The Free Press, 16 April 1957).

The view from Upper Bukit Timah Road of the entrance to Hillview Road had in itself, always interested me since the days of my backseat adventures. Hillview Road, and Hillview Avenue beyond it was one area that my father never seemed to go through. Looking through the narrow passage under the concrete supports of the railway girder bridge that runs across Hillview Road – always seemed to somehow suggest a sense of mystery of what lay beyond – the rise of the road beyond the bridge obscuring what lay beyond the little that was visible through the passage under the bridge. It was only much later in life that I actually discovered, to a sense of disappointment, what had lay beyond the bridge, on a visit to the Lam Soon Building during the early days of my working life. Later – the road would be one that I would become familiar with, on the many visits made during the course of my work to the installation that stands at the top of Bukit Gombak. By that time of course, much of the area that had in fact been one that was home to many factories in my days of adventure, being where the likes of the Union Carbide and Castrol factories had been located – had been turned into an area where many new sought after private condominiums had sprung up.

The narrow passage under the girder bridge at Hillview Road always seemed to suggest what lay beyond it was a mystery.

On top of the girder bridge at Hillview Road.

The other side of the "pass" near Hillview Avenue.

A scene of what's left of rural Singapore ... found along the railway tracks in the Bukit Timah Corridor - just next to the girder bridge at Hillview Road.

Across the road from the Standard Chartered Bank, I was pleasantly surprised to see a very recognisable distinctive roof structure proudly stood atop a hill – one that I had been familiar with in my days wandering around the area close to St. Joseph’s Institution in Bras Basah Road as a schoolboy there at the end of the 1970s, and one that had hitherto remained unnoticed by me. It is of course the roof of the church that is part of the Trinity Theological College, and is identical to the one on top of the building that was church of the same college, that still stands today – at the original location of the college atop Mount Sophia, next to what had been the Methodist Girls’ School – close by the shortcut I had used to get over to Plaza Singapura as a schoolboy.

The roof of the Trinity Theological College church - identical to its predecessor on the top of Mount Sophia.

The buildings that used to be part of the Trinity Theological College on top of Mount Sophia.

Crossing back to the other side of the road to the Fuyong Estate area where Rail Mall is, we were able to get on the side where the tracks crosses Upper Bukit Timah Road over the first of the two black truss bridges that I have somehow always identified the area with, pausing again for some photographs of the bridge. What is nice about the bridge is the arched pedestrian passageway through the concrete supports of the bridge on the footpath below. Getting a first glimpse of the bridge – I was able to appreciate the beauty of the riveted steel structure that has given the area its distinct flavour for close to eight decades. What I was also able to appreciate was the amount of effort that it would take to maintain the bridge if it was to be conserved once the railway has no use for it when the terminal station is moved from Tanjong Pagar to Woodlands – something that perhaps might prove prohibitive in any considerations taken be the authorities for their preservation – something that many of us would like to see.

The Rail Mall is close to the first of the black truss bridges on the southward journey down the Bukit Timah Corridor.

The view of the black truss bridge from the Rail Mall area.

The northbound view of the black truss bridge from the tracks.

The southbound view along the tracks from the black truss bridge.

Another view of the tracks up the black truss bridge.

The arched pedestrian passageway under the bridge.

Further along Upper Bukit Timah Road – we came to the area opposite the Old Ford Factory – I guess we would all be familiar with the factory and its significance in Singapore’s history as this is already very well documented. A lesser known fact about the area is perhaps the existence of a keramat – one that as some believers would have it, had a part to play in the cessation of fighting (prior to the surrender of the British to the Japanese at the Old Ford Factory) during the Second World War. That keramat, the Keramat Habib Syed Ismail, also popularly referred as the Keramat Batu Lapan – a reference to its location at the eight milestone of Bukit Timah Road, had laid in a clearing across the railway tracks, through a path into the seemingly thick vegetation that had existed in the area. The keramat was excavated several years ago and doesn’t exist today. The keramat, one that is of an Indian Muslim saint, was said to have been where Muslims had prayed for an end to hostilities during the Japanese invasion in early 1942 and fighting had as some would have it, stopped miraculously just across the road – making the keramat a highly venerated shrine for many years that followed.

Another view of the black truss bridge ... the bus is heading south towards the area where the old Ford Factory and the site of the former Keramat Batu Lapan is.

The ridge of the hill where the former Ford Factory, which was once an busy assembly plant for Ford Cars, also featured Hume Industries – a steel maker to the north – and it was these greyish structures that would come into sight on the southbound journeys in the backseat before one of my favourite sights along the way would come into view – the huge Green Spot bottle that stood at the entrance to the Amoy Canning Factory which stood next to the Bukit Timah Fire Station, close to what had been a traffic circus. The station was one that was in fact typical of the Fire Stations found in rural Singapore and much of Malaysia in the1960s and 1970s – one that had with it flatted quarters for the firemen and their families. Interestingly – there is also a crest on the station that I noticed passing by – one of the old Coat of Arms of Singapore – similar to the one that can be found atop Mount Emily at the entrance to Mount Emily Park – just next to Mount Sophia. Further along the way – where again private housing now stands across the road opposite the area close to where the entrance to Hindhede Road is – there was another factory on the ridge – one with a logo painted on the wall that was well known to me – from the many ice lollies that I had feasted on as a child, the Magnolia Factory.

The old Singapore Coat of Arms on the former Bukit Timah Fire Station.

Similar to the one that appears at the entrance to Mount Emily Park.

The former firemen's quarters next to the former fire station.

The rest of the trek took us to another another girder bridge, past Jalan Anak Bukit across a notorious shortcut to Rifle Range Road, past the other black truss bridge and onto our end point – Bukit Timah Station – something I guess I would have to find time later to prepare a post on.

A walk down the Bukit Timah corridor: Wandering along the new railway and rediscovering the old

During much of a rain and lightning interrupted eight kilometre walk with friends from the level crossing at Choa Chu Kang Road, I was surprised to discover that, despite the high-rises on the horizon and the other signs of modernity that have replaced what was a rural feel of much of Singapore beyond the city limits, I was able to immerse myself in a countryside where time seems to have forgotten. The walk, motivated by the sense of nostalgia for the old railway line which was prompted by the impending shift of the KTM station to Woodlands, allowed us to have a glimpse perhaps of a slice of Singapore that would be forgotten very soon after the last of the trains of the old railway which has been with us since 1903, makes a final stop at Tanjong Pagar sometime before the first of July next year.

Starting point of the walk - the Phoenix LRT Station in the new Singapore that has replaced the countryside of the old.

The walk took us through many of the areas that I have mentioned in another nostalgia related post on the railway, “Journeys Through Tanjong Pagar: The Station at Bukit Timah” (also on asia! as “Keeping Track of Time”), allowing me and several others a last look at the stretch of line that is characterised by the two black steel truss bridges that crosses Bukit Timah Road. For me, it was also a chance to revisit the area which I had become familiar with as a young child, and as a consequence, my childhood, having first been acquainted with it staring out of the opened window of my father’s Austin 1100 on the many road trips made through the area.

How the area might have once appeared to me ... a scene from the backseat of a car further south along Upper Bukit Timah Road (source: http://www.singas.co.uk).

The same general area as it looks today.

The first stop we made, having met at Phoenix LRT station, was the level crossing at Choa Chu Kang Road. This provided a wonderful opportunity for me to do what as a child I always enjoyed – that is catching the train traversing what must certainly be the last major level crossing in Singapore, a crossing that is today, made across the six lanes of Choa Chu Kang Road. Somehow, watching the trains running across at road level, just in the shadow of a modern elevated urban railway line, the Bukit Panjang Light Rail Transit (LRT) system, seemed surreal … as was the scene around the level crossing. Looking up the tracks on the north bound side of the crossing, it looked as if the tracks were taking a path to an abyss – the abyss being a plot of land that I had once been familiar with from the many occasions that I had walked through it as a shortcut to Woodlands Road from one of the camps I had been at during my National Service – Stagmont Camp. I had on many occasions as well been on training exercises during my stint at the camp which involved walking up and down the areas around the tracks – once leaving a rifle behind in the dark, which I was fortunate enough to find with the help of my army mates, only having discovered my carelessness a few kilometres up the tracks.

The northbound track into the "abyss" that I once was familiar with from my days in National Service.

On the other side of the crossing, a little hut that serves as the control station for the crossing stands – with a little yellow outhouse behind it, as well as a village like house that was perhaps a common sight in the area once, that served as the quarters of the railway staff manning the crossing. The area of the control hut is probably close to the site of Bukit Panjang Station, one of the stations on the original Singapore to Kranji Railway line. Bukit Panjang Station was also one of the main stops along the line after the 1932 Railway Deviation which gave us the grand station at Tanjong Pagar and the two black truss bridges we see in the area. I am not sure when the station stopped functioning or was demolished – but perhaps like the Phoenix that the nearby Phoenix Estate and LRT station is named after, a new Bukit Panjang Station is slowly – but surely, rising out of its ashes nearby – part of the new railway line – the Downtown MRT line, which for a large part, will run parallel to the original railway line which ran from Kranji down via Newton to the original terminal at Tank Road.

The KTM control hut at on the other side of the level crossing.

A scene reminiscent perhaps of the countryside of old.

The KTM staff was kind enough to allow the use of the outhouse ....

The new railway is being built to replace the old ... the Downtown Line is being constructed parallel to the old railway line.

Deciding that it was too dangerous to walk physically along the tracks, not just because of the dangers of walking along or close to the railway track, but also in anticipation of the fury that, the god of thunder, Thor, seemed to want to unleash, we made our southward trek first along Upper Bukit Timah Road. This took us past the Murugan Hill Temple, a relatively recent addition to the area, having moved to its current location in 1992 from its original home in Sungei Tengah where it could trace its history back to a shrine that was put up in 1962. In getting there, we had also walked past a structure that is reminiscent of the very first overhead bridges in Singapore – constructed of steel with open sides – a temporary overhead bridge erected across Upper Bukit Timah Road that has perhaps been recycled from a decommissioned first or second generation overhead bridge.

An overhead bridge reminiscent of the first overhead bridges in Singapore.

The new Murugan Hill Temple which shifted to the Bukit Panjang area from its original home in Sungei Tengah in 1992.

Continuing further south, we had a quick look at the second level crossing in the area – a smaller one with a delightful old wooden gate, and some of the abandoned buildings around before the sheets of rain that accompanied Thor’s fury came down forcing us to take what little shelter the KTM buildings in the area had offered. After a while, with the rain not showing any signs of abating, we decided to cross the road to wait the rain out at a coffee shop and it was probably an hour before we were able to continue with our walk.

A scene from the "countryside" enroute to the level crossing at Gombak Drive.

Parts of Upper Bukit Timah Road still have that old world feel.

More of the old world feel ...

 

The railway building near the level crossing at Gombak Drive where we took shelter from the storm.

Looking north from the level crossing at Gombak Drive.

Further along the route, we walked past the Boys Town complex … this was the destination that, as boys growing up in the 1960s and 1970s, many feared they would end up in for misbehaving – or so many of our parents then had us believe. It was probably a huge misconception that existed then that Boys Town was a correctional facility and a home for delinquent boys – although it did actually house a boys home, as well as a vocational school which did also take in troubled boys as well as orphans, with a view to providing a home as well as an education. The home and vocational school was started in 1948 by the Gabrielite Brothers, a Catholic Missionary group, as the St. Joseph’s Trade School before being renamed as “Boys Town”.

The once feared Boys Town complex ...

Further along the way, we decided to explore the Stations of the Cross at St. Joseph’s Church – probably one of the last remaining village Catholic churches in Singapore – with a cemetery in its yard. The cemetery had once been a shortcut for me – getting from the church to a friend’s house up Chestnut Drive. Back then, the church side of Chestnut Drive had been lined with single storey wooden houses that were rented from the church who owned much of the land around Chestnut Drive. What is unique about the Stations of the Cross is that this is the only Catholic church in Singapore where the stations are located outside the church. The church building in itself is also rather unique – featuring a 33 metre tall pagoda like roof structure that rises above the area rather prominently. The building was completed in 1964 and consecrated by the then Archibishop of Malacca-Singapore, Michael Olcomendy on August 30, 1964, and built to cater for the growing congregation on the site of a previous building that had been built some 110 years prior to that.

The St. Joseph's Church building built in 1964 on Upper Bukit Timah Road features a pagoda style roof that rises some 33 metres.

The original St. Joseph's Church, built 110 years before the structure we see today (source: St. Joseph's Church website http://www.stjoseph-bt.org.sg/St_Joseph_Website/About_Us.html).

The outdoor Stations of the Cross - unique to St. Joseph's Church in Singapore.

Chestnut Drive as it appears today. It used to be lined with houses that were rented from the church.

There are probably not many who know this, but Chestnut Drive was where a temporary Magistrate’s Court was set up in 1967 in the newly built school building that became the Chestnut Drive School. The next part of the walk continued southwards towards the area where the first of the two black truss bridges in the area, as well as the girder bridge that straddles Hillview Road are … which I will continue with in another post.