Singapore Land Transport Authority (LTA) received its first new train for the Thomson-East Coast Line (TEL) which enters trials on this fully automated line.
The trains are manufactured by a consortium of Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Ltd – CSR Qingdao Sifang – Kawasaki Heavy Industries (Singapore) under a USD 552.4 million contract signed with LTA for the supply of 91 new four-car trains. They are Singapore’s first trains with five doors on each side of every train car to facilitate commuter boarding and alighting. Currently the train cars have 4 doors on each side.
Following the arrival of the first TEL train, the remaining 90 trains will be delivered from August 2018, with approximately two trains arriving per month. All 91 trains are expected to be delivered by 2022.
Two of the new TEL trains will be installed with the Automated Track Inspection system of cameras, lasers, and sensors. It provides the first line of inspection against rail defects or faults which may occur. The line cameras are able to detect defects such as rail cracks, missing fasteners or even foreign objects. 
Within the TEL project, LTA announced that works on Mandai Depot are 60 percent completed, with tracks in the depot substantially completed. The Mandai Depot is an integrated rail and bus depot. The train depot will have an Operations Control Centre, a Depot Control Centre, a stabling yard with capacity for 90 four-car trains, administration buildings, storage warehouses, workshops capable of servicing 11 trains concurrently and ancillary facilities for storage, cleaning, maintenance and overhaul to ensure smooth and safe operations of TEL train fleet and associated railway systems.
The bus depot will provide parking and maintenance facilities for at least 550 buses. The construction of Mandai Depot was awarded to Jurong Primewide Pte Ltd under a USD 242.6 million contract. Construction works started in December 2013 and are scheduled to be completed in 2019.
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