Final milestone for DTL1

PM Lee officiating the launch of DTL1 at Downtown station

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong officiated the opening of Downtown Line 1 this morning. This marks an end to 6 dedicated years of construction right up from preliminary works, road diversions, excavation, structural completion, backfilling, delivery of escalators, fitting of M&E components, trackwork, alterations to existing interchanges and gradually watching the exit and vent buildings take shape on the surface.

While the DTL shines for having the deepest stations and subway tunnels in Singapore, a not widely known fact is that it also boasts to have the shallowest tunnels between 2 underground stations. At its shallowest point, the roof is approximately GL100.50 as seen from the cross section, a mere 1.5m from the street surface at Robinson Road. Just 700mm follows the existing EWL tunnels below. This sector was indeed a significant challenge during the construction phase, coupled with busy streets and heavy traffic in the city centre.