With effect from Monday, 6 August 2012, SMRT will increase the current ‘Early Travel’ discount to fifty cents. This is an increase of twenty cents from the current 30 cents.
When the scheme was first introduced in 1997, the discount was only ten cents. This was increased to the current thirty cents last October.
The 50-cent discount will benefit passengers on the North-South East-West Lines (NSWEL), Circle Line (CCL) and Bukit Panjang LRT (BPLRT) who arrive at 14 city area stations before 7.45am on weekdays (Mondays-Fridays, excluding public holidays).
To be eligible for the discount, commuters will need to board from the NSWEL, CCL or BPLRT stations and alight at one of the fourteen designated stations: Bugis, City Hall, Dhoby Ghaut, Lavender, Orchard, Outram Park, Raffles Place, Somerset,Tanjong Pagar, Bayfront, Bras Basah, Esplanade, Marina Bay or Promenade.
I feel that the early travel discount scheme is a good plan to encourage more people to take the trains at an earlier timing. The pantry ten cents (when the scheme was first launched) would probably not make many people bother to wake up earlier. In the first place, the scheme wasn’t even widely publicized and I only knew of it when they increased it to thirty cents last year. The new fifty cents is more reasonable and would be able to influence the travel patterns of more pattern.
The missing piece now is of course the lack of a similar scheme on the North-East line (NEL).
So, if someone were to board the trains from the NEL, he or she will not get any early travel discount. 🙁
For the early bird MRT travellers, it’s probably a better deal to sign up at http://www.insinc.sg to participate in the decongestion study and benefit from the prizes. I’ve been winning between $1 to $50 over the past few months.
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