What Can the World Learn from Singapore about

Urban Transportation Systems?

Presented by Professor David Boyce

August 27, 2007

Slides from Singapore’s Land Transport Authority www.lta.gov.sg and Prof. D.-H. Lee, NUS.

What and where in the world is Singapore?• Singapore is an island nation located on the equator

in southeast Asia near the Malay Peninsula.• The island is 270 sq. miles with 4.6 million residents

(2007 est). (By comparison, Chicago is 234 sq. miles with nearly 3 million residents.)

• Languages are English (commerce and education), Mandarin, Malay and Tamil, reflecting its diverse population: Chinese, Malaysian, Indonesian, and expatriates of the British Commonwealth and USA.

• Singapore gained independence in 1965, and is a representative democracy controlled by one party, making it somewhat authoritarian in character.

South East Asia bySPOT 4 Vegetation Instrument

Singapore is a city state in South East Asia, a garden city.

City/Urban Area Land Area(sq. kilometers)

Population(1,000 persons)

Density(persons/sq. km)

Beijing – Urban Area 1,381 9,369 6,785

Hong Kong 1,100 7,041 6,295

Shanghai 6,300 17,420 2,750

Singapore 700 4,326 6,389

New York City 786 8,104 10,316

New York Urban Area 8,683 18,498 2,130

City of Chicago 588 2,862 4,867

Chicago Urban Area 5,498 8,711 1,584

London 1,579 7,500 4,697

Paris Urban Area 2,723 9,644 3,542

Economy, Trade and Transportation• Singapore has a well-developed market economy

based on manufacturing, and is diversifying further to foreign trade and tourism.

• Per capita GDP is over US$ 29.9K; US is $ 44.2K.• Port of Singapore is one of the largest in the world.• Singapore’s airport is also world class: Singapore

Airlines plus 80 other airlines connect Singapore to 179 cities in 57 countries (2005).

• Singapore’s land transport system is a world leader in public transit, road pricing and ITS, with an effective system of car ownership restraint.

• How do these land transport systems work together to serve the people of Singapore?

Land Use Planning and Development

• Singapore from its beginning has stressed the development of housing for its people, including publicly owned housing estates with associated shopping districts.

• Land development for commerce and industry has been well-coordinated, especially with regard to the location of transportation services.

• The concept is shown in the next slides showing the relation of land development to Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) corridors.

Overview of the Land Transport System• Total road length 3,110 km, including 150 km of

expressways and 571 km of major arterials;• Vehicle population: 800,000, including over

400,000 private passenger cars;• Mass rapid transit: 65 stations, 138 km of tracks;• Bus transport: nearly 4,000 buses serving 200+

routes with two operators;• Taxi: 23,000 vehicle fleet with eight operators;• Mode share: 55% by bus and rail transit.

• Rail transit (MRT) emphasizes comfort and ease of use, but not high speed; LRT are automated lines.

• Two areawide bus systems offer point-to-point and rail feeder services with frequency and fares set by competition;

• Automated feeder service to rail stations in high density residential clusters;

• Integrated, automatic fare collection system;• Transit infrastructure and vehicles provided by the

government, with operating costs being paid by the farebox;

• Widely available, low-cost taxi services.

Public Transit System

Rapid Transit Network - 2030Rapid Transit Network - 2030

Medium Capacity Strategic LRT

Light Capacity LRT

Heavy Capacity Strategic MRT

JURONG EAST

WOODLANDS SELETAR

TAMPINES

• Electronic Road Pricing to shift travel by route, time-of-day, mode, destination and frequency;

• Road system operated with ITS technology (no time for details in this seminar).

Expressway – Arterial Road System

Objective: Operate roads at Level of Service D or better.

Road Pricing

• Manual road pricing, the Area Licensing Scheme, was introduced in the CBD in 1975;

• That system needed much manpower, was inconvenient, and inflexible in varying road prices.

Electronic Road Pricing (ERP)• Automated the Area Licensing Scheme• Fully replaced the manual scheme in Sept. 1998 • A new generation of ERP is being studied

Gantry Equipment

Antennae

Antennae Vehicle Detectors

Antennae Vehicle Detectors Enforcement Cameras

Gantryless Electronic Road Pricing

1 Singapore $ ≈ US$ 0.66(2003 point-by-point tolls)

4%

38%

11%

32%

15%

3%

34%

12%

39%

12%

ITS Deployment

• Expressway Monitoring and Advisory System (EMAS)

• Adaptive traffic signal control, GLIDE (Singapore’s version of SCATS)

• Transit.Smart• Traffic.Smart• i-transport

Car Ownership Restraint Policies• Excise tax (over 100% of car value)• Annual road tax (about S$ 1,000) based on engine

size and age• Certificate of Entitlement to license car for 10 years

– about S$ 10,000• High fuel prices relative to cost of production• Parking requirements and fees• Cars are not manufactured in Singapore, so there

is no direct economic development impact of car purchases on the Singapore economy.

Current Status and Future Plans• During 1997-2007, S$ 3.4 B was spent on roads;• The 10th expressway will cost S$ 2.5 B for 5 km;• Future road construction is limited by lack of land,

so S$ 20 B will be spent to increase the rail network from 150 km (S$ 13 B to date) to 215 km;

• Bus improvements will reduce all headways to 10 minutes or less.

• Even so, roads must be priced to avoid overuse; ERP is keeping roads moving at average speeds over 55 kph (33 mph);

• Vehicle ownership taxes reduced from S$ 3.4 B (1997) to S$ 1.7 B (2006) as ERP was phased in;

• Vehicle population increased from 680 K (1997) to 800 K (2006) as a result, but congestion did not increase;

• Hence, ERP is more effective, and less expensive for motorists (S$ 90 M/year), but needs to be expanded to maintain the Level of Service D objective;

• Next goal is to introduce continuous pricing over the system, rather than the current point-by-point pricing.