MANILA, Philippines — Instead of imposing a full suspension of weekend operations, the Metro Rail Transit-3 (MRT-3) will only implement partial operations of its trains from October 10 to 11.
“Sa halip na ipatupad ang scheduled full suspension of weekend operations upang magbigay daan sa pagsasaayos ng turnouts sa Taft Ave. Station, magpapatupad na lamang ng partial operations ang MRT-3 mula October 10-11,” the management of the rail line said in an advisory Thursday night.
(Instead of implementing the scheduled full suspension of weekend operations to provide time for turnout works, there will only be partial operations of the MRT-3 from October 10 to 11.)
“Ibig sabihin, patuloy na magkakaroon ng biyahe ang mga tren mula North Ave. Station hanggang Shaw Boulevard and vice versa,” it added.
(This means that there will still be trips of trains from North Avenue Station until Shaw Boulevard and vice versa.)
Turnouts are used to enable trains to switch from one track to another.
Once turnout works are completed at the North Avenue Station turnback, turnout works will then be done at Taft Avenue Station in the following dates: October 10 to 11, October 31 to November 2, and November 14 to 15.
Last October 1, the MRT-3 increased its train running speed from 30 kilometers per hour to 40 kilometers per hour. The management of the rail line is targeting to further increase it to 50 kph in November and 60 kph to December once turnout works are completed.
MRT-3 said these activities are part of the “massive rehabilitation and maintenance” being made by its maintenance service provider Sumitomo-Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in the rail line.
In an interview with ABS-CBN’s Teleradyo on Friday, MRT-3 director for operations Michael Capati said only the scheduled partial operations for October 10 to 11 is announced for now.
“We will announce ‘yung final ng October 31 tsaka November 15 at least two weeks before ng implementation,” he said.
(We will announce the final schedule of operations from October 31 [to November 2 and November 14] to November 15 at least two weeks before the implementation.)