The ETS will operate on 12 August 2010

ETS Ticketing office and Rail Cafe at Kuala Lumpur railway station

TRANSIT has found out that the Electric Train Service (ETS) between Kuala Lumpur and Ipoh is likely to start operations on 12 August 2010.

The main ticketing offices for the ETS as well as the “Railcafe” lounges will be located at the Kuala Lumpur and Ipoh railway stations. There will also be a ticketing office at KL Sentral railway station.

The ETS will operate two services – an Express service (in red on the route map below) stopping at a limited number of stations, and a Transit service (blue hexagon on the route map below) that stops at all stations between Rawang and Ipoh.

Fares:

It is expected that the fare will be RM30-35 for the express service, with a lower fare for the Transit service. We at TRANSIT find this interesting, because the KLIA Express Rail Link also charges RM35 for a trip (whether Express or Transit) but the trip to KLIA is far shorter than the trip to Ipoh. We hope that the RM30-35 fare will allow KTM to make a reasonable return on the cost of the ETS operations. And perhaps we should be seeing a reduction in the fare of the KLIA Express (or at least the KLIA transit) service.