Malaysia Proposes Single Clearance Entry System To Ease Causeway Congestion Into Singapore

Those who are familiar with the mass movement of workers daily from Malaysia to Singapore and back would know of the horrendous traffic congestion and time wastage just to get to their place of employment and back home.

Hopefully, all this would be a thing of the past if Malaysia’s proposed “single clearance system” at the Johor Causeway linking Singapore and Malaysia is approved and implemented.

Johor Works, Transportation and Infrastructure (JKR) committee chairman Mohamad Fazli Mohamad Salleh says, if this system is implemented the workers immigration clearance would only need to be done once on either side of the border.

According to The STAR, Mohamad Fazli further added that under this system, the Singaporean immigration officers would be stationed at our checkpoints in Johor to clear people entering the republic, while Malaysian immigration personnel will be deployed in Singapore to clear those entering into Malaysia.

He further added that, “This proposal is still at the initial stages. This will be similar to the system that will be used when the Rapid Transit System operations begin in 2026.”

Recently Johor Mentri Besar Datuk Onn Hafiz Ghazi voiced his appeal to the Singaporean counterpart with regards to the traffic situation at the Causeway where about 150,000 workers daily make their crossing at. He highlighted further that most commuters would need to wake-up at 4am just to start queuing up at the checkpoint by 5am and endure further traffic gridlock to make it to their places of employment on time. Not forgetting they would have to go through the same in order to get back home.

One reason for the congestion as highlighted by a Malaysian road user is the lack of personnel at the Singapore checkpoint resulting in the backlog.

Mohamad Fazli also mentioned that Johor was seeking additional funds to increase motorcycle lanes from 50 to 75 each way to help speed up the causeway crossings for motorcycles. He also noted that another proposal was to turn the existing lorry lanes into passenger vehicle lanes during weekends.

Source: The Star, Pictures: Wikipedia