Scratcher

Mine is not a recent story, but I share the frustrations. A few months ago I left Johor on a Friday night to meet an old friend and spend a weekend in Singapore. It took me 4 and a half hours to go from Johor to central Singapore. Seriously, I can travel to KL in that time. I have not been back to Singapore since, it just is not worth the effort.

Scratcher

Bocat

What a nightmare Geedee! 3.5 hours was my record for the Singapore/Malaysia trip. It's soul destroying sitting in that queue and once you're in it - you can't escape!

Why are you still up?!

geedee

Hi Scratcher. We're feeling the same way. We thought hiring a car would be great for weekend journeys into S'pore for a change, but that nightmare has really put us off. I haven't found traffic cams for the Malaysia side of the crossing yet.... that would help!

No.... the "U-Turn" is right at the checkpoint so if you've endured it that long you might as well wait the extra 30 minutes!

What was I still doing up??? I don't think I was up late... have you adjusted your BE time in the settings? (nor me, the posts are all still Canada time here!

How are you settling in???

geedee

Facebook comments indicate new "system in S'pore" with a barrier. Took a friend 4 hours to cross during the week... at lunch time. I will investigate and report :-)

bakedbean

As in..... Good system OR Bad system ?

geedee

So here's what they've dreamed up now:

Left home yesterday at a time that normally guarantees I'm in the office within the hour. It took two....

Sailed through Malaysia Immigration, not much traffic - hit the jam at Singapore on the downslope of the bridge. Crawled to the immigration booth, passport checked, barrier up.... couldn't move because of the next jam to customs.

Crawled to customs, had the car checked, barrier up... couldn't move because... wait for it.... they've installed traffic lights before you get onto the road.

Normally the cars filter from the two customs points in an orderly fashion; yesterday it was like being in a scrum. Nobody letting anyone in when the light eventually turned green. It was absolute bedlam.

I cannot think of any good reason for putting in this new bottleneck, but it's just doubled the crossing time.

Thank you Singapore.

geedee

In the spirit of fair and balanced reporting.....

Getting out of S'pore today... meganightmare! The Q to the Malaysian border stretched all the way back to.... the Singapore immigration counters

The buzz was that it was taking 6 to 8 hours to get across.

The word here is that it's tit-for-tat. S'pore making life hard most days, Malaysia making life really, really hard on the 50th anniversary.

Iskandar needs S'pore, S'pore needs Iskandar. Why can't they just work it out... this my pecker is bigger than yours just screws the whole place up. And this is why Asia will NEVER be the next super power.

bakedbean

You're upset, aren't you

geedee

I would have been if I'd needed to cross that day!

I do despair at the attitude to these land crossings... they could be so much smoother, with only a little outlay. We pay so much money to cross, and there's zero service, as though car drivers are second class citizens (bikers are 3rd!!).

It all started to get worse when the price of S'pore real estate started falling. The good thing is that's had a knock on effect over here, and I'm now saving a lot on rent.

geedee

Oh no.... seems to be true.... there's a rumour that next year (less than a month away!) they are going to ban heavy goods vehicles on the Woodlands crossing - they will have to use 2nd Link Tuas.
That is going to be an absolute nightmare.....

bakedbean

So...what is the point of that then? Are they trying to free up traffic at Woodlands? How strange.

geedee

They want to reduce congestion in the area to concentrate on building the Johor / S'pore MRT.....

bakedbean

Gotcha. So some Pain before you Gain.

Parnell

What is commute like now we are in Feb?

Is the am singapore too malaysia better than am malaysia to Singapore with same for pm?

Guess perk for some is to work in malaysia rather than commute?

AhXiong

Most of the time the jam is caused by JB custom. There are many counters, however they only utilized 50% of it. If all counters are open, I'm very sure it can improve the traffic flow.