William S

I can't really understand the point of taking the Airport Rail Link in Bangkok. The schedules are horrible at best, and you do not want to end up on the City Line which gets pretty full. If they could improve their schedules for the express service it could serve as a viable option. Taxis are cheap by world standards and well if not many traffic jams brings you quickly and directly to your destination.

Yappofloyd

Every trip has a range of considerations and no two trips are ever the same. The ARL is not for all, all of the time. Cost is rarely the main factor but for some it is. Time is often more important, for some just the experience of the journey is enough. For others too many bad experiences with taxis drivers from the airport.

However, if it is raining and peak hour you can bet that using the ARL to get to the inner city and closer to your destination will save much time.

transpac

Obviously this won't be happening anytime within the next 18 - 24 months, if not beyond. With Express service to just Makkasan on 60 minute headways, a lot fewer people will be riding the Express line. Most seem to think you'd need 15 - 20 minute headways, with a single Express service stopping at both Makkasan and Phaya Thai to have any reasonable chance of breaking even. However, until the track is reworked this is not feasible. Maybe in four or five years - once they have more rolling stock, and have reworked the tracks - the Express service will be a viaable option?

The City Line is great for commuters to/from the eastern suburbs, and ridership figures tend to peak during special events like protests, concerts and other special events in the city, or at Ramkhamhaeng. It is probably helpful for airport employees as well.

Not sure what the percentage of passengers is for people actually flying into/out of SBIA, but suspect it's fairly small?

I assume the concept ( airline/baggage check-in, spend time in the city, fast, comfortable trips to/from the airport ) of the City Air Terminal at Makkasan remains a pipe-dream for the foreseeable future? The amount of space going to waste there is amazing, save for the few TV shows/commercials which occasionally get filmed there.

Given all the problems, issues and financial losses the SARL does look like a losing proposition if analyzed in a vacuum, but any improvements in public transportation probably benefit the city, assuming fares remain subsidized and the huge losses can continue to be absorbed.

William S

Bangkok doesn't seem to have managed airport rail transportation very well. Kuala Lumpur you both have an express service and a stopping service, both which depart around every 20 minutes. Oslo Airport here in Norway has the airport express train every 10 minutes, during Monday-Fridays and Sunday peak hours and every 20 minutes during Saturday. Hong Kong is another good example. Beijing Metro and the Shanghai Maglev basically puts you in middle of nowhere, but they do have seemless connections to onward transportation.

Dr. HFH

This morning, 26 May 2014.

10:15 - Depart SGS lobby on foot.
- SGS - MRT Sukhumvit on foot
- MRT Sukhumvit - MRT Petchaburi; 16 baht
- MRT Petchaburi - ARL Makkasan on foot
- ARL Makkasan - BKK; 35 baht
10:59 - Arrive BKK ARL station
11:04 - Standing at PG ticket counter

49 minutes and 51 baht. Tough to beat!!

whackyjacky

Doc, it's great for you because you're at the SGS so often & you know how to travel light. A more likely scenario for most would be: 2 people, hotel > km to a station, walking in BKK heat, and dragging big bags up and down stairs. In that case, the extra 200B for the cab beats the Hell out of the train.

Diplomatico

Pretty much how I see it.

nvoi

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 4.1.2; en-us; GT-I8730 Build/JZO54K) AppleWebKit/534.30 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/534.30)

Too bad that the express train only leaves every hour... and none to phyathai - they should deploy that one on the makkasan line.

NickB

Frankly I do not see this as a major issue. the "city line" only takes 10 mins more to Phaya Thai and is roughly every 15 mins.

nkedel

Getting on at Phaya Thai it's not bad if you don't mind being a bit assertive about the space; given how full some of the city line trains get, getting on with bags at Makkasan for the city line would sound less than fun to me.

NickB

Agreed up to a point (at least at peak hours) but nvoi was lamenting that the express line no longer goes to Phaya Thai, which, imo, is not a huge issue.

EmailKid

^

To each his own I can never find anyone to join me on my journeys, travel light, and like the train, and to save 200 Baht as well

+1

Dr. HFH

Agreed. What made the ARL feasible for me on this trip was that 1) I only had a carry on since I was only going to be there for three nights, and 2) I was alone. If I had more than one bag, or only one bag but it was larger, then I, too, would have opted for a taxi or SGS transport. Also, even if only one light bag, multiple pax together makes a taxi economical pretty quickly.


I did find this interesting. The only stairs I recall encountering were the five stairs down from the top of the MRT Petchaburi escalator to the street before walking over to the Skywalk. Were those the ones you were talking about? Or were you talking about pax who go to hotels not so conveniently located to MRT/BTS?

whackyjacky

Most BTS Stations involve a lot of stairs. At Asoke or Sukhumvit there are escalators, & they always seem to work. Not so elsewhere & even if you get to ride up to the station level, you've still got 30+ stairs to the train.

Yappofloyd

This is incorrect. Every BTS station has at least one, mostly two, escalator from street level to concourse level and ALL stations have an escalator from concourse level to the platform so there is no need to use the 30+ stairs except for fitness reasons.
(Which was not the case back in the early 00s when only around 40% of the current escalators were installed)

However, going down from platform to concourse level will always involve using stairs (aside from the new stations beyond WWY which have lifts at the platform level). Concourse to street level will also involve using stairs except for those stations with a lift or those many will links to shopping centers/buildings.