Construction slated to cost 9.28 billion patacas
Construction of the Light Rail Transit (LRT) East Line has now “fully” commenced, which was marked by a groundbreaking ceremony on Friday.
The 7.7-kilometre-long LRT East Line will connect the Barrier Gate checkpoint at the peninsula’s northern tip and the Taipa Ferry Terminal in Pac On via the Zone A and Zone E1 land reclamation areas. The East Line will cross the sea between Zone A and Zone E1 through an undersea tunnel.
The Public Works Bureau (DSOP) made the announcement in a statement on Friday, which said that the ceremony marked “the full commencement of the project that is now being carried out at full pace”.
The project, which is earmarked to cost 9.28 billion patacas, is scheduled to be completed in 2028.
The LRT East Line will have six stations, including three stations in Zone A. All six stations will be built underground.
The first two stations of the LRT East Line, ES1 and ES2, will be built off the north-eastern coast of the peninsula. The two stations will require the land reclamation of the mudflats (aka tidal flats) off the coast.
The first station, ES1, will be built near the Barrier Gate checkpoint, while the second station, ES2, will be located near the Residência Macau residential estate.
The East Line will then run into Zone A, which will have three stations, namely ES3, ES4 and ES5, before crossing the sea through an undersea tunnel. The East Line will then enter Zone E1 where there will be one underground station, ES6, the sixth and last station of the LRT East Line. Afterwards, the track will gradually leave the underground segment and run on an elevated track to the Taipa Ferry Terminal station, the eastern terminus of the LRT Taipa section – Macau’s first LRT which came into service in December 2019.
Northern & southern sections
The government launched two separate public tenders for the LRT East Line project, namely the 2.9-kilometre-long northern section and the 4.8-kilometre-long southern section, in October last year.
According to the DSOP website, the 2.9-kilometre-long LRT East Line northern section will run from the ES1 station to the ES4 station, while the 4.8-kilometre-long southern section will run from the ES4 station to the ES6 station before linking up with the LRT Taipa section’s Taipa Ferry Terminal station.
After its assessment of the submitted tenders, the government hired a consortium consisting of China State Construction Engineering (Hong Kong) Limited – Macau Branch, China Construction Engineering (Macau) Company Limited, and Shanghai Tunnel Engineering Company Limited – Macau Branch in July to carry out the LRT East Line southern-section project for a price tag of 4.81 billion patacas, according to the website.
The following month, the government hired a consortium consisting of China Civil Engineering Construction (Macau) Company Limited, Nam Kwong Real Estate Company Limited, and China Railway 16th Bureau Group Company Limited – Macau Representative Office to carry out the northern-section project for a price tag of 4.47 billion patacas.
Consequently, the whole LRT East Line project is earmarked to cost 9.28 billion patacas.
According to the website, the southern-section project is scheduled to be completed in February 2028, while the northern-section project is scheduled to be completed the following month.
After the government commissioned the respective consortia of the southern-section and northern-section projects, they had to carry out various preparation work such as land surveying, before the projects could “fully” get off the ground.
Zone A, which is primarily being developed for public housing projects, is earmarked to have a population of 96,000.
East Line to serve 100,000 residents
Friday’s DSOP statement noted that the LRT East Line will connect two new urban areas, namely Zone A and Zone E1, linking up with the current LRT Taipa section which also serves Cotai.
The future East Line will serve around 100,000 residents, enabling them to travel from the peninsula’s north-eastern area to Taipa and Cotai without having to take other public transport, the statement said.
The statement noted that after the East Line comes into service, Macau’s LRT network will serve four major checkpoints, namely the Barrier Gate, the Taipa Ferry Terminal, the airport, and the Macau-mainland joint checkpoint on Zhuhai’s Hengqin island. The ongoing LRT Cotai-Hengqin section project is scheduled to be completed in November next year.
The statement also said that the East Line’s six stations will cover a gross construction area of over 90,000 square metres.
The statement said that the three LRT stations in Zone A would be connected with underground commercial streets that feature shops, other retail outlets and restaurants.
LRT passengers to reach 137,000
According to the statement, the government expects the two consortia to be able to overcome the LRT East Line project’s various technical difficulties, believing that they would be able to complete a “high-quality” project in compliance with the schedules and the commissioned costs.
The statement underlined that with the future operation of the East Line, the daily average number of LRT passengers could then be expected to reach around 137,000.
With only the Taipa section in service, the LRT currently has a daily average of less than 10,000 passengers.
Guests such as Public Works Bureau (DSOP) Director Lam Wai Hou (centre) symbolically break ground on the Light Rail Transit (LRT) East Line project on Friday. – Photo: DSOP
This undated handout photo released by the Public Works Bureau on Friday shows an anti-pollution net installed off the peninsula’s northeastern coast where two underground LRT stations will be built.
