The hopes of people in Bangkok to be able to travel all around the city on electric-rail routes will depend on decisions made by the interim government this year.

The Red Line will link Rangsit to Bang Sue and Bang Sue to Taling Chan. The Blue Line will connect Bang Sue with Bang Khae via Tha Pra. The Purple Line will connect Bang Yai with Bang Sue, and the Green Line will complete sections of the Mor Chit-Saphan Mai and Soi Baring-Samut Prakan routes.

Supervised by different authorities, the bidding for the new rail routes will be opened separately. The Red Line will come under the responsibility of the State Railway of Thailand (SRT). The Blue and Purple Lines will be operated by the Mass Rapid Transit Authority of Thailand (MRTA) and the Green Line by the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA).

Following a public hearing held on December 26, it seems likely that the bidding for the Blue and Purple Lines will be opened by August. Construction of the Purple Line is expected to be completed and operational in November 2011, while the Blue Line service is expected to be inaugurated in January 2013.

Although the date for the bidding for the Red Line has not yet been announced, construction of the 15-kilometre Bang Sue-Taling Chan section and the 25-kilometre Bang Sue-Rangsit routes are scheduled to be completed in May and December 2008, respectively.

If the schedule is adhered to, the Bang Sue-Taling Chan will be the first line to inaugurate its services. For the Green Line, the project will depend on how the BMA implements its schedule.

The total cost of the new electric-rail routes, as outlined in the budget requirement sent for Cabinet approval on November 7, is Bt165.4 billion.

To help finance the infrastructure project, the government is obtaining a loan from the Japan Bank for International Cooperation.

Meanwhile, contracts for the signalling system and rolling stock, worth a total of about Bt45 billion, will be granted to the private sector on a concessionaire basis.

However, an industry source said the bidding procedure - which requires the bidder to identify their rolling-stock suppliers before filing their application forms - favours the two existing operators, Bangkok Transit System (BTS), operator of Skytrain, and Bangkok Metropolitan Co Ltd (BMCL), operator of the subway system.

The source added that Siemens, supplier of rolling stock to both Skytrain and the subway system, is likely to have an advantage over other suppliers.

Moreover, BTS now plans to purchase more locomotives from Siemens this year.

The Purple and Blue Lines will help the subway system complete a transport loop while the Green and Red Lines will extend the Skytrain into Bangkok's suburbs.

"The competition for concessions to operate the extended electric-rail routes is likely to be between the two existing operators, BTS and BMCL. The other unknown is which supplier - Germany's Siemens or France's Alstom - will they choose," the source said.

The source added that whoever chose the supplier that quoted the lower cost would probably win the bidding.

The competition for the civil-engineering works is believed to be between local subcontractors Ch Karnchang, Italian-Thai Development and Sino-Thai Engineering and Construction.

Because of the planned extension of electric-rail routes, Maitree Srinarawat, director-general of Office of Transport and Traffic Policy and Planning, has refused to introduce a single ticket price of Bt15 per trip, as recommended by the previous government.

However, the ticket price must be acceptable to both concessionaires and the travelling public.

After services on the new routes have opened, Maitree said, they would help raise the number of passengers using the subway system from 200,000 trips per day now to between 800,000 to one million passengers daily.

Watcharapong Thongrung

The Nation