Tsuen Wan line

Tsuen Wan line
Traditional Chinese	荃灣綫
Simplified Chinese	荃湾线
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu Pinyin	Quánwān xiàn
Yue: Cantonese
Yale Romanization	chyùhn wāan sin
Jyutping	cyun4 waan1 sin3
IPA	[tɕʰy̏ːn wáːn ɕīːn]

Tsuen Wan line
Tsuen Wan line; 荃灣綫
	Train (M-Train) approaching Kwai Hing station
Overview
Locale	Districts: Central and Western, Yau Tsim Mong, Sham Shui Po, Kwai Tsing, Tsuen Wan
Termini	Central; Tsuen Wan
Stations	16
Service
Type	Rapid transit
System	MTR
Depot(s)	Tsuen Wan
Rolling stock	Metro Cammell EMU (DC)
Ridership	1,058,300 daily average ; (weekdays, September 2014)[1]
History
Opened	10 May 1982 (Tsuen Wan to Lai King section); 17 May 1982 (Rest of the line);
Technical
Line length	16 km (9.9 mi)
Track gauge	1,432 mm (4 ft 8 3⁄8 in)
Electrification	1.5 kV DC
Route map
	Tung Chung line
	to Tung Chung
	Airport Express
	to AsiaWorld–Expo
	Island line
	to Kennedy Town
	South Island line
	to South Horizons
	Island line
	to Chai Wan
	West Rail line
	to Hung Hom
	Kwun Tong line
	to Whampoa
	Kwun Tong line
	to Tiu Keng Leng
	Tung Chung line
	to Hong Kong
	Tung Chung line
	to Tung Chung
	West Rail line
	to Tuen Mun

The Tsuen Wan line is one of the eleven lines of the metro network in Hong Kong's MTR. It is indicated in red on the MTR map.

Platform screen doors in Central station on the Tsuen Wan line

Prince Edward Station in Kowloon

There are 16 stations on the line. The southern terminus is Central station on Hong Kong Island and the northwestern terminus is Tsuen Wan station in the New Territories. A journey on the entire line takes 35 minutes.

As a cross-harbour route that goes through the heart of Kowloon and densely populated Sham Shui Po and Kwai Chung, the line is very heavily travelled.

History

Construction

The Tsuen Wan line was the second of the three original lines of the MTR network. The initial plan for this line is somewhat different from the current line, especially in the names and the construction characteristics of the New Territories section.

The original plan envisioned a terminus in a valley further west of the present Tsuen Wan station. That Tsuen Wan West station is different from the current Tsuen Wan West station on the West Rail line, which is located under land reclaimed at a much later time. The line was supposed to run underground in Tsuen Wan rather than as currently on the ground level.

The approved route was truncated, terminating at Tsuen Wan station. The construction of the Tsuen Wan Extension project was approved in 1975 and commenced soon afterwards. Testing of the new line began on 1 March 1982.[2]

The extension was formally opened on 10 May 1982 by Sir Philip Haddon-Cave, the acting governor and former chairman of the Mass Transit Railway Provisional Authority. The project was opened seven and a half months ahead of schedule, and cost HK$3.9 billion, under budget compared to the original estimate of HK$4.1 billion.[2]

The new section from Tsuen Wan to Lai King and skipping all intermediate stations to Prince Edward opened on 10 May 1982 and joined the section under Nathan Road in Kowloon that had been in service since 1979 as part of the Kwun Tong line. On opening, Prince Edward was an interchange-only station with no option to enter or exit. It did not become a standard station until the remaining stations on the line in Sham Shui Po District, i.e. Sham Shui Po, Cheung Sha Wan, Lai Chi Kok and Mei Foo, opened a week later.

Several stations differ in names or location from the initial plan. During planning, Kwai Hing was named Kwai Chung, Kwai Fong was Lap Sap Wan (literally "rubbish bay", as the location was close to a now-disused landfill in Gin Drinker's Bay), Lai Wan (now Mei Foo) was Lai Chi Kok, Lai Chi Kok was Cheung Sha Wan, Cheung Sha Wan was So Uk. These stations were all renamed in English and Chinese before service began.

Upon the opening of the Island line, Chater, Waterloo, and Argyle, originally named based on the streets crossing or above the stations, Chater Road, Argyle Street, and Waterloo Road respectively, were renamed to Central, Yau Ma Tei, and Mong Kok, resembling the names of the station in Chinese. Lai Wan was renamed to Mei Foo in both English and Chinese.

Mong Kok station was planned to be built a bit further north of its present location and Sham Shui Po a bit further south of its present location before the need to accommodate an intermediate station, Prince Edward.

Transfer with Tung Chung line

When the Tung Chung line was constructed, Lai King was selected as an interchange so that passengers did not have to go all the way to Hong Kong Island to change trains. The northbound tracks on the Tsuen Wan line were moved to run above the southbound tracks at Lai King to support cross-platform interchange with the Tung Chung line.

The original platform 1 for Tsuen Wan-bound trains was removed and filled, becoming part of the current, wider low-level island platform. This allowed interchange with platform 4 for Hong Kong-bound Tung Chung line trains, which run on tracks further away from the original platform.

The new platform was opened in 1997, nearly a year before the Tung Chung line began service. Tracks were also built to the south of Lai King station linking the Tsuen Wan line and Tung Chung line; this is the only point where the Tung Chung line connects with the other urban lines.

Transfer with former KCR systems

To cope with extensions and new lines, Mei Foo and Tsim Sha Tsui stations had new subsurface walkways added to connect to West Rail line's Mei Foo and East Tsim Sha Tsui stations. The interchange facilities at Mei Foo opened in 2003 when the West Rail was opened. The interchange located at Tsim Sha Tsui entered service in 2004, along with the completion of the East Rail line's (formerly KCR East Rail) extension to East Tsim Sha Tsui.

Chronology

1967: Tsuen Wan line was included in Hong Kong Mass Transport Study
1970: Tsuen Wan line was included in Hong Kong Mass Transit Further Studies, as Kong Kow line and Tsuen Wan Branch
1977: Construction was approved and, not long after, started on 1 March 1979
16 Dec 1979: Jordan and Tsim Sha Tsui opened as part of Kwun Tong line
16 Dec 1979: Waterloo and Argyle opened as part of Kwun Tong line
12 Feb 1980: Admiralty and Chater opened as part of Kwun Tong line
26 Apr 1982: The original Kwun Tong line was split into two sections: the new Kwun Tong line ran as far as Waterloo, while Tsuen Wan line ran from Chater to Argyle; there were non-passenger Tsuen Wan line trains that continued to Tsuen Wan
10 May 1982: The line opened with service from Tsuen Wan to Lai King and then direct to Prince Edward Station, which was opened as an interchange with Kwun Tong line
17 May 1982: The remaining stations, Lai Wan to Sham Shui Po, opened; Prince Edward became a standard station
31 May 1985: On the opening of the Island line, 8 stations of the line were renamed. (See station list below for details)
23 May 1986: Central became an interchange station upon the extension of the Island line to Sheung Wan
11 Mar 1991: The line broke down and public transport was adversely affected
23 Apr 1993: Two interlinking carriages disconnected during operation within the section between Tsuen Wan and Tai Wo Hau. Nobody was hurt, and MTRC reported that a hook between the two concerned carriages was not fastened, leading to the incident
2 Jul 1997: The new platform 1 situated on the new high-level platform at Lai King opened
20 Mar 2003: To connect with the new KCR West Rail Mei Foo station, a passageway was built between the two stations, with a new exit D on about midway of the passageway
5 Jan 2004: A fire started in a train on its way to Admiralty station with 14 people injured. A 55-year-old male arsonist was responsible for the fire and was arrested the following day. A similar incident occurred at Tsim Sha Tsui station on 10 February 2017.
24 Oct 2004: A new exit G at Tsim Sha Tsui was constructed for a passageway under Mody Road to connect the station with new KCR East Rail
30 Mar 2005: A new exit F at Tsim Sha Tsui was constructed for a passageway under Middle Road to connect to East Tsim Sha Tsui station
21 Oct 2010: An overhead electric cable in Yau Ma Tei station broke during service hours; at least 280,000 passengers were affected.

Route description

The Tsuen Wan line runs north-south. It is mostly underground, beginning at Central and crosses Victoria Harbour after Admiralty to Tsim Sha Tsui. Then, the line first runs underneath Nathan Road (Tsim Sha Tsui to Prince Edward), then Cheung Sha Wan Road (Sham Shui Po to Mei Foo), before emerging from the hills at Lai King.

The line is elevated between Lai King and Kwai Hing. Between Kwai Fong and Kwai Hing, the tracks are covered to minimise disturbance to residents nearby. After Kwai Hing, the line re-enters the tunnel to Tai Wo Hau before finally re-emerging at ground level at Tsuen Wan.

Some of the underground stations on the line are significantly deeper than the others. Tsim Sha Tsui and Admiralty stations are deeper because they precede harbour crossings. Admiralty and Central are deeper as they provide cross-platform interchange with the deep-level Island line.

Geographically accurate map of the Tsuen Wan line

Stations

The following is a list of the stations on the Tsuen Wan line.

Livery and Station Name			Connections	Opening date	District
English		Chinese	Connections	Opening date	District

	Central	中環	Island line Hong Kong station for Tung Chung line and Airport Express	12 February 1980[lower-alpha 1]	Central and Western
	Admiralty	金鐘	Island line, South Island line and East Rail line (2021)	12 February 1980[lower-alpha 1]	Central and Western
	Tsim Sha Tsui	尖沙咀	East Tsim Sha Tsui station for West Rail line	31 December 1979[lower-alpha 1]	Yau Tsim Mong
	Jordan	佐敦
	Yau Ma Tei	油麻地	Kwun Tong line
	Mong Kok	旺角	Kwun Tong line[lower-alpha 2]
	Prince Edward	太子	Kwun Tong line	10 May 1982
	Sham Shui Po	深水埗		17 May 1982	Sham Shui Po
	Cheung Sha Wan	長沙灣
	Lai Chi Kok	荔枝角
	Mei Foo	美孚	West Rail line
	Lai King	荔景	Tung Chung line	10 May 1982	Kwai Tsing
	Kwai Fong	葵芳
	Kwai Hing	葵興
	Tai Wo Hau	大窩口			Tsuen Wan
	Tsuen Wan	荃灣	[lower-alpha 3]		Tsuen Wan

Notes

Originally opened as part of the Kwun Tong line.
Mong Kok station is not an interchange station to Mong Kok East station on the East Rail line in the MTR fare system. The two stations are not physically connected. There is pedestrian transfer via a footbridge; the journey time is approximately 10–15 minutes on foot.
Tsuen Wan station is not an interchange station to Tsuen Wan West station on the West Rail line, but green public light bus route 95K (free transfer with an immediate West Rail Line journey record on the Octopus card) connects the two stations. It normally takes 15–20 minutes to walk to Tsuen Wan West station.

Incidents

18 March 2019 collision

					to Admiralty station

					Crash site

			1 2		Central station L3
					(Tsuen Wan line
					terminating platform)

On 18 March 2019, two trains crashed in the crossover track section between Admiralty and Central while MTR was testing a new version of the SelTrac train control system provided by Toronto-based Canadian unit of Thales Group. There were no passengers aboard either train, although the operators of both trains were injured.[3] Before the crash site had been cleaned up, all Tsuen Wan line trains terminated at Admiralty instead of Central. Both MTR and Thales will be conducting their separate investigations. The same vendor also provided a similar signalling system in Singapore, which resulted in the Joo Koon rail accident in 2017.[4] In July 2019, the Electrical and Mechanical Services Department (EMSD) published an investigation report into the incident and concluded that a programming error in the signalling system led the ATP system to malfunction, resulting in the collision.[5]

References

"Weekday patronage of MTR heavy rail network from September 1 to 27 and September 28 to October 25, 2014" (PDF). Legislative Council. 29 October 2014. Retrieved 15 April 2015.
Mass Transit Railway Corporation Annual Report 1982. Hong Kong: Mass Transit Railway Corporation. 1983. p. 10.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mtr-corp-train-accident-idUSKCN1QZ03K
"Signalling system in Hong Kong MTR train collision a 'version' of that used in Singapore". CNA. 19 March 2019. Archived from the original on 30 January 2021. Retrieved 30 January 2021.
"Investigation Report on Incident of the New Signalling System Testing on MTR Tsuen Wan Line" (PDF). Electrical and Mechanical Services Department. 5 July 2019. Archived (PDF) from the original on 30 January 2021. Retrieved 30 January 2021.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.

[KTL-opened-3] Originally opened as part of the Kwun Tong line.

[4] Mong Kok station is not an interchange station to Mong Kok East station on the East Rail line in the MTR fare system. The two stations are not physically connected. There is pedestrian transfer via a footbridge; the journey time is approximately 10–15 minutes on foot.

[5] Tsuen Wan station is not an interchange station to Tsuen Wan West station on the West Rail line, but green public light bus route 95K (free transfer with an immediate West Rail Line journey record on the Octopus card) connects the two stations. It normally takes 15–20 minutes to walk to Tsuen Wan West station.

[1] "Weekday patronage of MTR heavy rail network from September 1 to 27 and September 28 to October 25, 2014" (PDF). Legislative Council. 29 October 2014. Retrieved 15 April 2015.

[mtrcorp1982-2] Mass Transit Railway Corporation Annual Report 1982. Hong Kong: Mass Transit Railway Corporation. 1983. p. 10.

[6] ttps://www.reuters.com/article/us-mtr-corp-train-accident-idUSKCN1QZ03K

[7] "Signalling system in Hong Kong MTR train collision a 'version' of that used in Singapore". CNA. 19 March 2019. Archived from the original on 30 January 2021. Retrieved 30 January 2021.

[8] "Investigation Report on Incident of the New Signalling System Testing on MTR Tsuen Wan Line" (PDF). Electrical and Mechanical Services Department. 5 July 2019. Archived (PDF) from the original on 30 January 2021. Retrieved 30 January 2021.