About Rochor Station
The Downtown line is a very interesting one.
Unlike most of our other MRT lines where they were planned stretch by stretch, what we know as today’s DTL was salvaged from three different plans, most of which had to be put to pasture after the Nicoll Highway tragedy of 2004. I’ve been meaning to write about the line for a while now, so since a question came up about Rochor, I might as well do it.
Because of its history, I thus believe one post is not enough to cover all the sections of the line that have an interesting background. Hence, I aim to cover one section of line in each post, making a multi-part series running all the way to the opening of DTL3 on 21 October 2017.
Let’s start
We’ll begin this series from Rochor station, which looks like a relatively normal station but is actually the “center” of the DTL.
In fact, the original plan was supposed to be much grander. It should have been a lot like Camden Town station on the London Underground, as an interchange between the eastbound and westbound directions of the DTL.
How is this possible? Just 100–200 metres away from the station, towards Bugis, are the tunnels of DTL3, under Bencoolen Street and Jalan Besar between what are now Fort Canning and Jalan Besar stations. Under the original plan, a set of platforms would have been built here, and connected to the current station structure.
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3223/2705573972_04ef26c084_o.jpg
This is an initial plan for DTL3 that I found on the Internet somewhere, so some details are rather off. For reference, DT18 in this picture is Chinatown station. DT21 (marked as an interchange) is what is now Jalan Besar station, though as you can see it was originally meant to connect to Rochor station.
However, there’s something above this entire conundrum — the North-South Corridor. Part of the NSC sits dormant above the current DTL2 station, waiting for the day when the rest of the expressway is constructed and can connect to this segment. There’s also an exit planned out to Jalan Besar/Bukit Timah Road from the expressway here, so that complicates things. Also, don’t forget the conserved shophouses that form part of the Little India district.
It does mean, however, that what you can build beneath all these things is severely restricted. In the interest of public safety, the relevant authorities have very strict regulations on ventilation and emergency escape rules for all construction projects in Singapore, not just rail transit projects.
Building a station under an expressway is difficult enough, building an interchange station (which have to be designed for far more passengers than a regular one) is even more difficult. Thus, it was probably decided to scrap the interchange plan. However, since Rochor station was already under construction, it was left as-is.
A missed opportunity
It was thus decided to move these platforms somewhere north and construct a new station there instead, which will open October 21 as Jalan Besar station. This is why you may recall that LTA came out to announce that they had to delay DTL3 because they had to add a new station to the works.
Right now, the current plan is that one must come up to street level, walk in the baking hot Singapore weather to the other station, and re-enter the rail system. Also, LTA recently announced that re-entering the rail system will disqualify you from getting transfer credits — so it’s a new fare and you must pay accordingly.
But if it does help the situation, I do hear whispers about a potential future construction of either a surface network of sheltered walkways, or even an underground walkway to be built in future. By who, I don’t know, but the option is there should the authorities decide to exercise it.
Ultimately, this in my opinion comes up to either poor planning or the unwillingness to take risks on LTA’s part, something that may or may not become a recurring theme in this blog. The scope of works in that area will be an utterly awesome and complex one. Properly engineered, it could have been one hell of a project.
Is it really worth it?
I must admit, the only real benefit of such an integrated interchange station is to facilitate east-west travel. But for east-west travel, you already have the Circle Line serving as an alternate route between Botanic Gardens and MacPherson stations. It’s shorter too — 8 stations by CCL instead of 17 by DTL.
Or if you’re within the Circle, it’s perfectly alright to just take the loop within the downtown area. Trains are fast, and stations are tightly packed together, so in the final analysis staying on the train might just be as fast as taking the transfer at street level. And it’s more comfortable, too!
On the other hand, one may think that the current plans to connect Jalan Besar and Rochor stations may be good enough to allow people to take a walk between the two stations. The only think LTA might have to do is to reconsider their stance on not providing a card transfer between the two stations, but perhaps that’s a topic for another day.
I think that’s all I have to say for now. The next post, which I think should be up next week, will discuss Newton station, why it lacks a paid in-system transfer, and what could have been done there.

