Plan to suspend North-South line between 11am-4pm cancelled

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Raffles Place MRT station on July 8, 2015. ST PHOTO: AW CHENG WEI

Singapore - The plan to suspend train operations between 11am and 4pm has been cancelled, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) said in a statement at about 10.30am on Wednesday.

It announced the cancellation after monitoring the train operations from early Wednesday morning.

LTA said: "Train service on the North-South and East-West Lines (NSEWL) resumed this morning (8 July 2015) at 5.30am and we have observed that there is no power tripping.

"SMRT gradually increased the number of trains injected into the two lines to improve train frequency. As such, trains were operating at intervals of two to three minutes on the EWL and NSL."

Free bus service will continue to be available from designated bus stops and bus interchanges in close proximity to NSEWL stations, it said. Commuters can also continue to use services provided on the North East Line (NEL), Circle Line (CCL) and Downtown Line (DTL).

Though just hours earlier, tens of thousands were complaining about the breakdown of the services, it was almost business as usual on Wednesday morning for those who were heading to work.

Commuters The Straits Times spoke to said that although there were minor delays, trains arrived at between two- and six-minute intervals on both the East-West and North-South lines.

On Tuesday night, both lines were disrupted for more than two hours following a power fault and the disruption affected an estimated 250,000 commuters.

HR executive Xie Kaiwei, 25, said she left her home slightly earlier, expecting delays, but found Tampines MRT station relatively empty.

"It seems normal. I read that there would be disruptions this morning, so I left earlier. But I think everyone rushed out earlier to take the train," she said.

Train operator SMRT put out a notice on its Facebook and Twitter earlier in the morning, informing commuters of train delays.

It also noted that train services on the North-South Line could be suspended from 11am to 4pm.

Civil servant Shafiq Mat Noor, 37, travelled from his home in Ang Mo Kio, to his office in Pasir Ris.

He said: "The train kept stopping from Ang Mo Kio down to Bishan, I didn't expect there to still be delays this morning." He added that the delays increased his travel time by about 30 minutes.

"This is really terrible; it's the first time two major lines have been affected."

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