SRT inks contracts for the construction of five dual-track train projects

By Thai PBS

 

 

The State Railway of Thailand (SRT) on Thursday (Dec 28) signed nine contracts with eight companies for the construction of the first phase of dual-track train project at an estimated cost of 69 billion baht.

 

The contracts signing ceremony which was held at the Royal Princess Bangkok Hotel was presided over by Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak.  Also presented at the ceremony as witnesses were Transport Minister Arkhom Termpittayapaisith and his deputy, Mr Pairin Chuchotethavorn.

 

The first phase of the dual-track train project covers five routes as follows:  from Lop Buri to Paknam Po; from Mab Kabao to Thanon Chira junction; from Nakhon Pathom to Hua Hin; from Hua Hin to Prachuab Khiri Khan and from Prachuab Khiri Khan to Chumphon.  The entire length of the dual track for the five routes is 702 kilometres.

 

Full story:  http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/srt-inks-contracts-construction-five-dual-track-train-projects/

 

-- © Copyright Thai PBS 2017-12-29

Where is the money coming from? Where are all these right wing yellow hypocrite's saying the T's robbed Thailand blind. So what is the difference now? 

A vital upgrade to SRT's infrastructure and infinitely more sensible (and more likely to happen) than the dream high speed railway.

 

The Transport Minister justifies the projected B69m rail programme cost by saying it will take traffic off the roads and out of the air. The only places where the roads suffer from heavy traffic are the urban areas such as Bangkok and Pattaya, i.e. mostly local and business traffic going about its hour-by-hour errands. Improved rail connectivity will take very little, if any, of this traffic. Out of town, Thai traffic densities are much lighter than many other developed countries, e.g. US, UK, Australia, and Europe. All that is needed here, to bring them up to the standard of those countries, are better repair works and better policing; two areas which are at present abysmally poor. But the regime would rather not mention this, since they've failed to make telling improvements here for nearly 4 years.

 

As for taking traffic out of the air, e.g. Bangkok to Chiang Mai, Phuket and Sakon Nakhon, the Minister sounds like he's had a pretty absurd dream, since none of the planned five routes will adequately serve these destinations. That statement of intent, if made in front of a knowledgeable audience, would have drawn loud laughter and jeering . . . let's see what it gets when they make it public, next week, maybe.

 

As always, just meaningless, but grand-sounding sound-bites from a regime that is desperately clutching at whatever straws it can to retain whatever support it may so far have garnered. Next, we're told it'll be wage rises . . . well, I'd never have guessed that in a million years . . . and with the election 'only weeks away' . . . who would have thought it?

Edited December 29, 20178 yr by Ossy
clarity

2 hours ago, webfact said:

The first phase of the dual-track train project covers five routes as follows:  from Lop Buri to Paknam Po; from Mab Kabao to Thanon Chira junction; from Nakhon Pathom to Hua Hin; from Hua Hin to Prachuab Khiri Khan and from Prachuab Khiri Khan to Chumphon.  The entire length of the dual track for the five routes is 702 kilometres.

 

And the long-term 20-year SRT track-doubling project slowly continues  ...

 

The fourth one from Hua Hin to Prachuap by Ital-Thai, was actually announced already at the end of July, when  "contracts are expected to be signed next month that will mean the line can begin building in September.", so that's another four months' slippage there then.

 

Although I believe PKK-Chumpon may be new, and represents further progress towards the already-completed double-tracks, from the border Southwards ?

 

At least nobody is pretending this is about high-speed passenger-only trains.

 

 

34 minutes ago, Ricardo said:

 

And the long-term 20-year SRT track-doubling project slowly continues  ...

 

The fourth one from Hua Hin to Prachuap by Ital-Thai, was actually announced already at the end of July, when  "contracts are expected to be signed next month that will mean the line can begin building in September.", so that's another four months' slippage there then.

 

Although I believe PKK-Chumpon may be new, and represents further progress towards the already-completed double-tracks, from the border Southwards ?

 

At least nobody is pretending this is about high-speed passenger-only trains.

 

 

SRT guy: What's four months, between friends? . . . we thought you'd be happy that we'd delayed all the mess and chaos that the works will cause. If you don't want the sodding dual-track, just tell us . . . we'll soon find something else to waste the money on.

Money far better spent than on high speed, that they can manage with known stakeholders.

4 hours ago, Chris Lawrence said:

Where is the money coming from?

All borrowed from China.

• No domestic or foreign private investors interested, likely due to the economic risk of default. The project was originally proposed as a joint venture between Thailand and China but Prayut insisted that Thailand be 100% invested in the project.
• Because of the potential for default the Chinese government wanted a higher interest rate than that given by Japan on another transportation project (something like 2.5% vs 1.5%). Prayut insisted a lower interest rate and when he paid China an upfront additional "consulting fee" of Bt3-4 billion, China agreed to Prayut's lower interest rate.

The loan for China is good for China's GDP growth.

If revenues prove insufficient for payment of debt service, capital replacement costs and O&M costs, the loan is not good for Thailand's GDP growth.

 

2 hours ago, Ossy said:

SRT guy: What's four months, between friends? . . . we thought you'd be happy that we'd delayed all the mess and chaos that the works will cause. If you don't want the sodding dual-track, just tell us . . . we'll soon find something else to waste the money on.

 

Given the delay, perhaps they'll be able to have more-than-one groundbreaking ceremony, on this route too !

 

Always a nice photo-opportunity, for the poo-yais & wanna-be's, when there might be an election coming-up ?

I really do hope that SRT do a better job with this project than anything else they have been charged with running.

My thoughts would be that the money would be better spent upgrading their existing broken down rail

systems, upgrading the so called airport express & a decent freight train to the deep sea water port 

in Laem Chabang so taking 500 heavy trucks off the Pattaya highway

5 hours ago, Ossy said:

The Transport Minister justifies the projected B69m rail programme cost by saying it will take traffic off the roads and out of the air. The only places where the roads suffer from heavy traffic are the urban areas such as Bangkok and Pattaya, i.e. mostly local and business traffic going about its hour-by-hour errands. Improved rail connectivity will take very little, if any, of this traffic. Out of town, Thai traffic densities are much lighter than many other developed countries, e.g. US, UK, Australia, and Europe. All that is needed here, to bring them up to the standard of those countries, are better repair works and better policing; two areas which are at present abysmally poor. But the regime would rather not mention this, since they've failed to make telling improvements here for nearly 4 years.

 

As for taking traffic out of the air, e.g. Bangkok to Chiang Mai, Phuket and Sakon Nakhon, the Minister sounds like he's had a pretty absurd dream, since none of the planned five routes will adequately serve these destinations. That statement of intent, if made in front of a knowledgeable audience, would have drawn loud laughter and jeering . . . let's see what it gets when they make it public, next week, maybe.

 

As always, just meaningless, but grand-sounding sound-bites from a regime that is desperately clutching at whatever straws it can to retain whatever support it may so far have garnered. Next, we're told it'll be wage rises . . . well, I'd never have guessed that in a million years . . . and with the election 'only weeks away' . . . who would have thought it?

Oh, I think that you are being a little harsh, after all construction of a whole 3.5 KM of track in Pak Chong, a part of the wonderful high speed, double track, standard gauge, route on its way to China, will probably soon be under construction. This line will bring enormous benefits to the Thai train spotting fraternity, who may even be able to afford a journey on one of these trains once in a blue moon.

38 minutes ago, natway09 said:

I really do hope that SRT do a better job with this project than anything else they have been charged with running.

My thoughts would be that the money would be better spent upgrading their existing broken down rail

systems, upgrading the so called airport express & a decent freight train to the deep sea water port 

in Laem Chabang so taking 500 heavy trucks off the Pattaya highway

"My thoughts would be that the money would be better spent upgrading their existing broken down rail

systems, ......."

 

What do you think they are doing? This is dual-tracking of the existing metre gauge system already in place. Not HST.

 

"The first phase of the dual-track train project covers five routes as follows:  from Lop Buri to Paknam Po; from Mab Kabao to Thanon Chira junction; from Nakhon Pathom to Hua Hin; from Hua Hin to Prachuab Khiri Khan and from Prachuab Khiri Khan to Chumphon.  The entire length of the dual track for the five routes is 702 kilometres."

39 minutes ago, natway09 said:

I really do hope that SRT do a better job with this project than anything else they have been charged with running.

My thoughts would be that the money would be better spent upgrading their existing broken down rail

systems, upgrading the so called airport express & a decent freight train to the deep sea water port 

in Laem Chabang so taking 500 heavy trucks off the Pattaya highway

 

But this is an upgrade to the existing metre-gauge system, dualling the tracks South from Bangkok, part of a 20-year plan to do as you suggest.

 

And one earlier part of that project, already completed a few years back, was to dual the tracks into Laem Chabang.

 

The Ministry of Transport now needs to produce more than just words, about their proposed road-to-rail transfer-centres, to make use of this work already done (or underway) on the existing system, and which will also help with onward movement of containerised-freight from/to the Chinese medium-speed heavy-freight (& a few passenger-trains) standard-gauge line.

12 minutes ago, ratcatcher said:

"My thoughts would be that the money would be better spent upgrading their existing broken down rail

systems, ......."

 

What do you think they are doing? This is dual-tracking of the existing metre gauge system already in place. Not HST.

 

"The first phase of the dual-track train project covers five routes as follows:  from Lop Buri to Paknam Po; from Mab Kabao to Thanon Chira junction; from Nakhon Pathom to Hua Hin; from Hua Hin to Prachuab Khiri Khan and from Prachuab Khiri Khan to Chumphon.  The entire length of the dual track for the five routes is 702 kilometres."

There seems to be some confusion as to whether the Southern route was going to be metre or standard gauge to connect with the route from Nong Khai that the Chinese are hoping will connect them to Singapore (eventually)

2 minutes ago, lincolnshire poacher said:

There seems to be some confusion as to whether the Southern route was going to be metre or standard gauge to connect with the route from Nong Khai that the Chinese are hoping will connect them to Singapore (eventually)

Confusion seems to be the norm when reporting of anything to do with transportation is involved.

The Prayut government has a road map for the country, perhaps they also need a railway map to clarify who's doing what, where and for whom in this regard.

At this time there is no standard gauge connection in Malaysia to  join up to. There is Standard Gauge for HST. from K.L. to Singapore but KMT, Malaysia railways from K.L. to Padang Besar is metre gauge.

Just now, ratcatcher said:

Confusion seems to be the norm when reporting of anything to do with transportation is involved.

The Prayut government has a road map for the country, perhaps they also need a railway map to clarify who's doing what, where and for whom in this regard.

At this time there is no standard gauge connection in Malaysia to  join up to. There is Standard Gauge for HST. from K.L. to Singapore but KMT, Malaysia railways from K.L. to Padang Besar is metre gauge.

I assume that the line from Kunming through Laos to Nong Khai will be standard gauge as I believe the Chinese are on with it at the moment, so the trucks and locomotives will have to be changed somewhere near Bangkok for the journey down to KL where the loco and rolling stock will revert to standard gauge. Sounds like great fun, I wonder if anyone has told the Chinese this yet ?

10 minutes ago, lincolnshire poacher said:

I assume that the line from Kunming through Laos to Nong Khai will be standard gauge as I believe the Chinese are on with it at the moment, so the trucks and locomotives will have to be changed somewhere near Bangkok for the journey down to KL where the loco and rolling stock will revert to standard gauge. Sounds like great fun, I wonder if anyone has told the Chinese this yet ?

What you just asked is more familiar to Dave67 and Ricardo, but AFAIK, the freight connection from Laos will branch off at Kaeng Khoi junction, near Saraburi and head down to Chonburi, Laem Chabang port. I believe the Thai / Malaysian metre gauge system runs all the way down to Singapore but not sure how they would handle containerized freight.

 

1 hour ago, ratcatcher said:

What you just asked is more familiar to Dave67 and Ricardo, but AFAIK, the freight connection from Laos will branch off at Kaeng Khoi junction, near Saraburi and head down to Chonburi, Laem Chabang port. I believe the Thai / Malaysian metre gauge system runs all the way down to Singapore but not sure how they would handle containerized freight.

 

Correct, the bulk of the freight should logically be loaded onto container-ships at Laem Chabang, no need to take it along metre-gauge lines all-the-way South ?  Malaysia anyway recently signed a deal with China for a port-rail-port link, which appears to solve that problem ?

 

http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/malaysias-east-coast-rail-line-touted-as-a-game-changer

 

The existing metre-gauge route can handle container-traffic, but perhaps not-as-reliably (the Thai single-track section is often closed by flooding in winter) or in such volumes, as the new standard-gauge to the Eastern-Seaboard & Bangkok ought to do ?

 

 

On 29/12/2017 at 2:06 PM, ratcatcher said:

"My thoughts would be that the money would be better spent upgrading their existing broken down rail

systems, ......."

 

What do you think they are doing? This is dual-tracking of the existing metre gauge system already in place. Not HST.

 

"The first phase of the dual-track train project covers five routes as follows:  from Lop Buri to Paknam Po; from Mab Kabao to Thanon Chira junction; from Nakhon Pathom to Hua Hin; from Hua Hin to Prachuab Khiri Khan and from Prachuab Khiri Khan to Chumphon.  The entire length of the dual track for the five routes is 702 kilometres."

We did 250k Double track in Malaysia from start to finish 6 years

On 29/12/2017 at 7:32 AM, Crossy said:

A vital upgrade to SRT's infrastructure and infinitely more sensible (and more likely to happen) than the dream high speed railway.

 

Common sense prevails at last

On 12/28/2017 at 11:03 PM, Chris Lawrence said:

Where is the money coming from? Where are all these right wing yellow hypocrite's saying the T's robbed Thailand blind. So what is the difference now? 

The only people who rob the country are dressed in Brown, Green and yellow, I thought everyone knew that

 

5 hours to the new year guys stay safe and all the best to you and your family for 2018