SINGAPORE : Work along most parts of the MRT Circle Line is up to speed, despite a number of delays in the wake of last year's Nicoll Highway accident, the Land Transport Authority has said.
For the first time, the media were taken six floors down into the site to see a tunnel breakthrough along Stage 3 of the line.
It started with a low hum, and within minutes, the loud roaring of the tunnel boring machine brought down an 80-cm thick retaining wall, into the tunnel at Lorong Chuan Station.
While the tunnel boring machine has come through from Serangoon Station to Lorong Chuan, over the next months, it will do the same thing from the opposite direction -- from Bishan Station to Lorong Chuan.
Concrete slabs will then be laid to create a tube system through which trains will run.
A 5.7 kilometre line, the S$1.2 billion Stage 3 of the Circle Line has five stations -- Bartley, Serangoon, Lorong Chuan, Bishan and Marymount.
It will intersect with the North-South Line at Bishan and the North-East Line at Serangoon.
And while there have been delays for the overall system, LTA says it is catching up.
Said Land Transport Authority CEO Yam Ah Mee, "CCL3 is on schedule. Parts of the other contract behind because of Nicoll Highway are being brought back to schedule and we are working on this revised schedule. Stages 4 and 5 the contracts are out and starting work soon. With this, the Circle Line should be open by 2010."
But there are other delay-related issues LTA still has to handle, among them claims by some contractors because of the delay.
Said Brigadier-General Yam, "The claims are being submitted. We are looking at it closely and then discuss with contractors before deciding what we will do."
In related Circle Line news, LTA says 70 percent of the owners at Hock Kee House have accepted its upfront compensation.
Concerns among the owners are now focused on the valuation amount of their properties, which will only be known in early September. - CNA /ct
Because, contractor are now demanding compensation for delay