Central Expressway
Length	15.8km
Direction	North - South
Starting/Ending at	Yio Chu Kang (SLE, TPE) Bukit Merah (AYE)
Main areas passed through	Seletar Ang Mo Kio Serangoon Bishan Toa Payoh Central Area Bukit Merah
Expressway(s) intersected	SLE, TPE, PIE, AYE
No. of ERP Gantries	4
No. of tunnels	2 (Kampong Java Tunnel, Chin Swee Tunnel)

The Central Expressway (Abbreviation: CTE; simplified Chinese: 中央高速公路; pinyin: Zhōngyāng Gāosù Gōnglù; Tamil: மத்திய விரைவுச்சாலை; Malay: Lebuhraya Tengah) in Singapore is the major highway connecting the city centre of Singapore with the northern residential parts of the island, including Toa Payoh, Bishan and Ang Mo Kio and further onwards to the Seletar Expressway and the Tampines Expressway.

[edit] History

The first stage of the expressway begun as two separate parts: one from Seletar to Bukit Timah Road (next to Cavenagh Road), which was opened on 17 June 1989 and the second from Chin Swee Road in Chinatown to the Ayer Rajah Expressway in Radin Mas. The second stage of the expressway also involved the construction of the two tunnels, the north tunnel being 0.7 km long and the south tunnel being 1.7 km long, that travel underneath previously built-up areas, including the Singapore River, Fort Canning Park and Orchard Road. This stretch was opened on 21 September 1991. The CTE tunnels were the only underground roads in Singapore until the Fort Canning Tunnel was opened on 16 January 2007 and the only expressway with tunnels until the second stretch of the Kallang–Paya Lebar Expressway were opened on 26 October 2007.

As it is the only expressway to connect the city and the northern residential areas, it is more prone to congestion than the other expressways in Singapore. In the latest attempt to relieve congestion, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) announced on 27 May 2005 that with effect from 1 August 2005, Electronic Road Pricing (ERP) operation hours for the CTE will be extended into the evening, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. This is the first time that evening ERP hours were introduced for a Singapore road.

A section of the CTE passes under the Singapore River, causing significant water seepage problems. Despite the LTA plugging nearly 2000 leaks and spending "millions", on 9 May 2007, chunks of concrete fell from the ceiling of the south-bound tunnel. There were no injuries.^[1]

Central Expressway is coloured brown in this map.

[edit] Road interchanges

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Central Expressway

• Traffic cameras monitoring the CTE
• Infopedia article on Central Expressway

v • d • e Expressways and semi-expressways of Singapore Expressways Ayer Rajah Expressway · Bukit Timah Expressway · Central Expressway · East Coast Parkway · Kallang–Paya Lebar Expressway · Kranji Expressway · Marina Coastal Expressway (U/C) · North–South Expressway (planned) · Pan Island Expressway · Seletar Expressway · Tampines Expressway Semi-expressways Nicoll Highway · Outer Ring Road System · West Coast Highway

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