Sentosa Monorail

The Sentosa Monorail is a now-defunct monorail system which operated on the southern Singaporean island of Sentosa from February 1982 to March 2005.
==History==
Plans for a monorail system around Sentosa were announced around 1979 to make commuting around the island easier as well as making it more attractive to potential visitors. Construction began in 1980 and was expected to be finished in April 1982, but was completed two months ahead of schedule. The system's construction was overseen by Swiss company Von Roll, who also constructed the Singapore Cable Car. The monorail system opened on 23 February 1982, with the bus services plying those locations terminated, making the monorail the main form of transport around the island. The monorail operated in a unidirectional loop consisting of four stations although later it was extended to seven, with the Spanish solution (board on one platform, alight at another) implemented at some of the stations. Due to rough rides, decreasing popularity and the rapid modernization of the island, the system took its last passengers on 16 March 2005 and subsequently closed, with the stations around the island either repurposed or demolished; the system was then replaced by the Sentosa Express about a year later. Portions of the old track still exist today, incorporated into some of the island's attractions.
==Rolling stock==
The rolling stock on the monorail was a series of unclassified sixteen-car straddle-beam monorails, numbered A through M. These were manufactured by Von Roll and were powered by diesel engines mounted in the cab car and were controlled by a single driver. The front windshield could be pushed outwards for better ventilation. The cars were not air conditioned, with the doors having no windows; according to riders the ride was rough and slow in its final days, with passengers being able to smell the diesel fuel through fumes emitted from the cab. After the monorail system was closed, large portions of the track and the monorail cars were sold for scrap for $350,000. No cars survive today.
==See also==
*Hitachi small-type monorail (Sentosa Express), the successor to the Sentosa Monorail
Category:Von Roll locomotives
Category:Scrapped locomotives
Category:Monorails