Bishan MRT Station

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Bishan MRT Station 碧山地铁站 பீஷான் Rapid transit
Bishan MRT Station is the only at-grade station in the current MRT network.
Station statistics
Address	200 Bishan Road Singapore 579827
Coordinates	1°21′03″N 103°50′54″E / 1.350804, 103.848213
Lines	North South, Circle (U/C)
Connections	Bus, Taxi
Structure	At-Grade/Underground
Levels	3, 1 (U/C)
Platforms	Island
Tracks	4, 2 (U/C)
Other information
Opened	7 November 1987 (North South Line)
Accessible
Code	NS17/CC15
Services
Preceding station   Mass Rapid Transit   Following station Ang Mo Kio towards Jurong East North South Line Braddell towards Marina Bay Lorong Chuan towards Dhoby Ghaut Circle Line (under construction) Marymount towards HarbourFront
Location
Bishan MRT Station

A train entering the station.

Concourse level of Bishan Station.

View of underground platform at Bishan Station of the Circle Line from ground level. (under construction) This station interchanges with Bishan station on the North South Line

Bishan MRT Station (NS17/CC15) is a Singapore Mass Rapid Transit station along the North South Line that serves the Bishan community, especially that of Bishan East. The station is located in Central Singapore. It is located along Bishan Road, close to the town centre of Bishan. It is often filled with students on weekdays in the afternoon as it serves the Ministry of Education Language Centre, a faculty of the Ministry of Education that allows secondary school and junior college students to study their second or third languages that are not available in their own schools. Some trains from Bishan depot arrive at platform B of the station to travel southbound towards Marina Bay for evening peak period services.

[edit] Cultural impact

The station is the only station in the MRT system to completely rest on terra firma and is represented by the middle section of the SMRT logo. Even so, the station is below sea level. One can, however, see the surroundings from the station since it is open-air, unlike other underground stations.

The station is also rumoured to be haunted, and has been the subject of several Singaporean urban legends, as well as the site for allegedly true encounters of ghosts. A local newspaper, The Sunday Times, once ran an article debunking an urban legend associated with the station, but it also ran alongside the article an account by a passenger who claimed that, while riding on a train passing through the station one morning in the early 1990s, she was groped by several unseen hands before passing out. She was later revived by fellow passengers. There are also other alleged encounters of ghosts and other entities by several passengers in and around the station, such as headless figures, footsteps being heard coming from the roof of the train, and phantom passengers that did not cast any reflections on the train windows.

[edit] Circle Line linkage and changes to current station

Construction is currently under works for the station to be linked to the Circle Line. When that is done, the station would serve both the North South and Circle lines. This would enable passengers to travel to the North-East region of Singapore by train without traveling to the city. The future Circle Line Station will be perpendicular to the current North-South Line station. The station is adjacent to the Junction 8 Shopping Centre and will be linked altogether through future expansion.

A new platform will serve the South bound train (heading towards Marina Bay) and the current North South Line platform will be dedicated to the North bound train (heading towards Jurong East via Woodlands). A wall will be built on the current South bound platform to partition the platform from the tracks. The upgraded station will be fully air conditioned and platform screen doors will be installed, in a way to prevent commuters from falling onto the tracks, as seen in previous cases in the history of Bishan station, mostly fatal.

As of 27 February 2007, air-conditioning ducts are being installed, while the new south-bound platform has begun to take shape. In addition, the lift serving the platform and the street level is now operational.

As of 10 June 2008, platform screen doors on the new platform have all been installed. Work on the platform's interior is underway and the new platform will be due to open around the fourth quarter of 2008.

Construction is currently underway for the Bishan MRT Station to be linked to the Circle Line.

[edit] Current Station Layout

[edit] Bus services

Bus services are available at Bishan Bus Interchange located a short distance from the station and at the bus stops along Bishan Road.

Service	Between	And
SBS Transit Trunk Services
13	Yio Chu Kang Bus Terminal	Upper East Coast Bus Terminal
52	Bishan Bus Interchange	Jurong East Bus Interchange	Euro IV
54	Bishan Bus Interchange	New Bridge Road Bus Terminal
55	Bishan Bus Interchange	Siglap Road (Loop)
58	Bishan Bus Interchange	Pasir Ris Bus Interchange
88	Pasir Ris Bus Interchange	Toa Payoh Bus Interchange	Euro III
156	Sengkang Bus Interchange	Clementi Bus Interchange
SMRT Night Rider Services
NR1	HarbourFront Bus Interchange	Yishun Ring Road (Loop)

[edit] Station vicinity

• Junction 8 Shopping Centre
• Bishan Community Library
• Catholic High School
• Raffles Institution
• Raffles Junior College
• Whitley Secondary School
• Kuo Chuan Presbyterian Primary School
• Kuo Chuan Presbyterian Secondary School
• Ministry of Education Language Centre
• ITE College Central (Bishan)

[edit] Incidents

[edit] 2002 Accident

On Nov 7 2002, a 10-year-old boy was taken to KK Women's and Children's Hospital in the evening, after being dragged by a southbound MRT train along the platform at Bishan MRT station. The child, Moses Tan, had a fractured right leg, a fractured right shoulder, bruises on his limbs and chest, and lacerations on his head after the incident.

[edit] 2004 Accidents

A 31-year-old Chinese man Mr Joseph Tan, a resident of Kim Keat, was found trapped under a train and died after falling on the track in front of an oncoming train in Bishan MRT station at about 1pm on Jul 28 2004. The tragedy disrupted the northbound service between Toa Payoh and Ang Mo Kio MRT stations for about an hour.

The second fatal accident at this station happened when a 74-year-old man, who was a resident of Toa Payoh died when he fell and was hit by an oncoming northbound train at Bishan MRT station in the afternoon of Sep 15 2004. ^[1]

[edit] 2007 Accident

On 4 March 2007, a man fell onto the tracks of the MRT station. A commuter on the platform pressed the emergency stop plunger and the train driver also braked in time. It was later reported that the man in question was high on drugs and slipped onto the tracks as a result.

[edit] References