WHEN WILL THE BANGKOK AIRPORT RAIL LINK START BUSINESS ? SKYTRAIN BTS OR SUBWAY MRT ?

Since its started the Suvarnabhumi Airport Rail Link project is far behind schedule and over budget.

The opening is expected to be at least 16 months late, not including the two or three months testing period, with the earliest opening date to be in 2009.

The budget is already well over 20 billion baht with no end in the possible future and STECON, the construction company who associated with the former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra will be fined for being on the wrong side.

MOT and SRT have agreed to allow the extension for the construction of airport link to STECON but they reserve the right to cancel the construction if there are any more irregularities, and they allow only 378 days of extension instead of 463 days as requested by STECON, maybe because they know that 378 days won't be enough anyway.

The first lot of Airport Express rolling Stock will be delivered at Laem Chabang by the end of October 2007 but the rail link infrastructure will be done by the end of May 2008, and electrification not before the end of October 2008.

Then SRT will have to operate for two months without passengers to test the new systems, and the Suvarnabhumi airport rail link is expected to open to public in January 2009.

But based on past timelines and the short testing period between October 2008 and January 2009, it seems that the grand opening date will occurs a few months later.

Also, looking at the project, the rail construction itself might not yet be finished at the end of December 2007, and the construction of the new express rail link stations has just started, so how could the Bangkok Airport Link be ready for passengers at the beginning of the year 2009 ?

Let's just expect that the construction company STECON doesn't cut corners in quality to save time given the shortened construction deadline and that passengers and tourists will be safe when using the new Suvarnabhumi Airport Rail Link.