Traffic office pins hopes on new train line projects
The transport policy and planning office expects the proportion of travel by public transport in the capital to increase to 50% over the next six years after the construction of electric train lines is complete.
The Office of Transport and Traffic Policy and Planning (OTP) director-general Chaiwat Thongkamkoon said around 32 million trips are made daily in the capital and its surrounding areas nowadays. However, only 30% of them are made using public transport, he added.
The ratio is expected to increase to 50% in 2024 after the construction of 10 electric lines is complete and the trains are operational, he said.
“When construction is complete, the daily ratio of those who use private vehicles to travel versus those who use public transport will change in favour of the latter,” Mr Chaiwat said.
According to him, the existing electric train network in the capital is insufficient since several areas are still located far from the main networks, such as the BTS Skytrain and the MRT subway.
Journeys in the capital are expected to increase to 50 million trips per day by 2042, according to the office.
The office’s travel demand survey last year showed that Bangkok has a total population of about 13 million people, but only 1.04 million people, or 8%, used public transport while 92%, or 11.7 million people, used private vehicles.
Figures show the number of passenger cars in Bangkok has reached 8 million and the number increases by 2,000 per day on average.
Unfortunately, Bangkok has only around 600 roads in its city network, according to the OTP.
The Transport Ministry’s first mass rapid transit master plan in Bangkok and its metropolitan area, also known as M-MAP1, currently involves the construction and expansion of an initial 12 electric train routes by 2029.
The network is set to span 509 kilometres, including the pre-existing Skytrain and subway networks. The plans comprise the construction of expansions for the MRT Blue and Purple Lines, as well as northern and southern extensions of the BTS Skytrain network.
The latest addition to the M-MAP1 plan is a high-speed railway to connect Don Mueang airport to Suvarnabhumi airport in Samut Prakan and U-tapao Airport in Rayong. The project, fast-tracked by the government to boost economic development in the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC), gained cabinet approval late last month.
The 200-billion-baht megaproject involves constructing railways along the present Airport Rail Link network, which stretches from Phaya Thai to Suvarnabhumi.
The new railways will connect Don Mueang to Phaya Thai and Suvarnabhumi to U-tapao, in a planned 220km network. The Bangkok-U-tapao route will take about 45 minutes to reach either destination, with a fare of around 330 baht.
The trains have been tipped to reach top speeds of up to 250km per hour.
Kanit Sangsubhan, secretary-general of the EEC Office, said earlier that an environmental impact assessment for the Don Mueang to Suvarnabhumi route had already been completed, while an assessment for the remaining Lat Krabang-Utapao route is currently under way.