A Few Posts on Singapore – Keppel Road Station to Close Soon…so go see it

Posted: April 21st, 2011 | No Comments »

Actually I can’t confirm it, but it has been previously announced that Singapore’s lovely Keppel Road Railway Station (also known as Tanjung Pagar Station or Singapore Railway Station) is to close this July. It seems that the station will be redeveloped (hopefully restored – to knock it down would be a crime and I’m not sure Singapore would do that now, surely they have enough shopping malls?) and trains will go to the far less stylish Woodlands station (where you do immigration if you arrive in Singapore by train). So having to go from KL (where sadly you now board not at the beautiful old Moorish station but at the new Sentral Station) to Singapore recently I took the train. It’s a long ride – leaves KL at 9am and gets to Keppel Road about 4.30-5pm but if you have a day to spare it’s a nice trip – cheap and you can idle a day reading a book and looking out the window. Bizarrely even the coach is faster! So this is not high speed rail but it’s a damn site nicer than either another plane ride or staring out the window at a motorway embankment for hours. And of course there’s the carbon emissions or lack of.

Admittedly the carriages are a little shabby – at least the so-called Premier carriage (not very expensive though) had not been refurbished on my train but the ordinary coaches had new seats but a little less room. In case you’re interested here’s the premier seat and cabin.

And so to the station:

The station frontage – completed in 1932

The booking office still in use

Nice vaulted arches – the B&Q shed thing is a Malaysia tourism board hut and of course not integral to the design!

More vaulted arches and the rather odd Malaysian Swiss chalet shed!

The exterior of the station featuring the four white marble reliefs by the Italian sculptor Rudolfo Nolli (who worked often in Asia and did the decorations on the Fullerton Hotel – formerly the GPO) which are: