SINGAPORE - The Land Transport Authority has awarded a $136.8 million contract to Kawasaki Heavy Industries consortium to supply 12 six-car trains for the North-south, East-west lines.

The 12 trains are the final batch of the 57 new trains that will be put into service from 2016 to 2019 . The first of these 12 trains will arrive in Singapore in early-2018, and will undergo testing at the NSEWL depots before they are put into service around the middle of 2019.

These trains will be the first to have tip-up seats that will provide more flexibility onboard. They will also come with three rows of strap-hangers, triplicated grab-poles for standing passengers and dynamic route map display.

Together with additional trains for the North-east Line and Circle Line, 99 more trains will be added to the network between this year and 2019, expanding the fleet by almost 50 per cent.

The first of the 57 new trains for the NSEWL will start plying from next year. For the Circle Line, 12 new trains would have joined its existing fleet of 40 by the end of this year, while four would also have been added to the North-east Line's fleet of 25 trains.

By the end of next year, all the 42 new trains for the Circle and North-east lines would be fully deployed.

Kawasaki has supplied most of the trains on the NSEWL. Its first delivery was for the inaugural fleet of 66 six-car trains in 1986, with additional fleets of 56 trains delivered in 1999, 2011 and 2013. The Japanese manufacturer has tied up with CSR Qingdao Sifang to make trains in China.