Due to the overwhelming crowd and instantly filled trains, Mr Shafiee Hayee (right) sometimes had to wait for the next train. -- ST PHOTO: LIM CHIN PING

Even when a train with room to spare comes along, he has to fight for his bit of standing space for the 35-minute commute from Bukit Gombak to Tanjong Pagar via Jurong East.

It has been like this at 8.30am for 10 years.

He said: 'It is a nightmare trying to board the train from Jurong East because there are always already so many people in it.'

It is hoped his situation and that of other commuters will improve from next week, when additional train trips will be introduced during the peak hours, as announced by Transport Minister Raymond Lim last Friday in his second of three policy speeches on improving the land transport system here.

Operators SMRT and SBS Transit will add 93 train trips - 83 for SMRT and 10 for SBS Transit - every week to ease peak hour congestion in the morning and evenings.

This will mean less-crowded trains and a cut in waiting time by up to 15 per cent.

With the current peak hour waiting time ranging from two and a half to four and a half minutes, a 15 per cent cut will bring the longest wait down to about 3.8 minutes.

And when the carrying capacity of the North-South and East-West lines is increased by 15 per cent in four years with new trains, waiting times will go down further to two minutes.

Although the trains can pack in up to 1,800 passengers, they now carry up to 1,400 during peak hours.

This indicates that there is room to spare on board, but 57 per cent of commuters who responded to a survey by the Land Transport Authority last year said they were not satisfied with the crowdedness on board.

Read the full report in Tuesday's edition of The Straits Times.