Sunday, February 21, 2010

Bangkok - Getting Around

Underground and Above Ground
Bangkok recently completed both a subway and a tram (they call it the sky train.) The subway looks similar to the one in Singapore - modern, air-conditioned, with glass curtains along the tracks to keep the heat out.

There weren't too many people there the first time we rode the subway - it was off-hours.

Strangely, you cannot ride both the subway and tram on one fare. I bought a 3-day subway card and a 1-day tram card.

This is a shot of the tram map. There are two tram lines. The dotted blue line is the subway. As you can see, they overlap at certain stations.


The sky train rides on elevated tracks above the street. You can either climb the stairs or take an escalator up to the platform. It's pretty high up - probably 3-4 stories above ground.

When the sky train is about to arrive, a uniformed attendant blows a whistle. Full employment at work, no doubt.

The windows are treated such that the sun cannot get in but you can see out. A wise idea when the temperature is above 90 every day.

2 comments:

Sal said...

Have you ever ridden the subway/tram in Boston? It's as old as/older than the subways in NYC: decripit, dirty, slow. Makes a nice change to see clean modern subways, huh?

FN said...

Yep, I've ridden the subways in Beantown. I think part of the reason I was attracted to NY initially was the grittiness of everything. Now, in contrast, I see all the beautiful, modern infrastructure in Asia and don't feel so enamored of decrepitude.