I boarded the train at Bishan MRT station on Monday at about 3.15pm, heading to Marymount station.

While waiting for the train at Platform Door 7, I read a notice posted on the platform door that the train would be driverless and that the doors would close automatically.

While boarding, the platform doors closed heavily on me, followed a split second later by the train doors. There was no buzzer alert warning that the doors were about to close.

Bishan is an interchange station, thus, there would be more passengers alighting and boarding than at many other stations.

One would reasonably expect that the timing of these automatic doors would be calibrated to take this busier passenger traffic into consideration.

Also, it is reasonable to expect that doors would have sensors to prevent them from shutting prematurely on commuters.

There was also no platform marshal to usher passengers.

I was fortunate that two men helped to hold the doors ajar long enough for me to enter the train.

I am 63 and I shudder to think of an older person being caught by the closing doors. I am 1.73m tall and weigh 70kg, and I did feel the pain of the closing doors, not to mention a ruined business shirt.

Train operators should improve standards of safety for passengers.

Ronnie Neo Soon Heng