Malaysia, which owns the station and 16 miles (26 kilometres) of rail tracks up to the border, will formally hand over the land at midnight on Thursday to Singapore under an agreement the countries reached after years of negotiations that became an irritant in bilateral relations.
"Most of all, I will miss the central location of the station. Since the train comes all the way into the heart of Singapore, there was hardly a need for me to navigate my way around," said Ann Chia, 54, who lives in Malaysia and often took the train to visit her sister in Singapore.
Chia was one of the hundreds of people who have crowded the Tanjong Pagar station this week to take a last look at its Neoclassical and Art-Deco architecture. The station was built in 1932 when Singapore and Malaysia formed the British colony known as Malaya.
The two countries separated in 1965, but Malaysia held on to the station and the land on which the tracks ran, from Tanjong Pagar up to the border.
Last year, Malaysia agreed to hand over the railway land in return for six plots in Singapore to be controlled by M-S Pte. Ltd. – a venture 60 per cent owned by Malaysian state investment fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd and 40 per cent owned by Singapore's Temasek Holdings Ltd.
A new station was built in Woodlands on the edge of the city-state near the causeway that links it to the Malaysian state of Johor.
The titular head of Johor, Sultan Ibrahim, will drive the last train that will depart Tanjong Pagar at 10pm. He obtained a train engineer's license last year. All seats on the train were sold out.
Although it will no longer be in service, the train station – with its 72-foot (20-meter) ceiling over the central hall and tiled wall murals – will be preserved as a national monument.
Despite dozens of daily cheap flights and coach services between the two countries, the train service remained popular among Singaporeans, Malaysians and tourists because of its charm and ease of the journey.
"I first took the train into Tanjong Pagar with my husband when we got married. We wanted to start a new life together in Singapore, and I remembered thinking how grand the station looked when the train first pulled in!" said Choo Gek Hwa, a 73-year-old Malaysian.
"When I heard about the fate of the station, I felt that part of me had closed too," said Choo, whose husband has died. "We even took wedding photos at Tanjong Pagar Railway station and now that it is closed, it feels like a chapter of my life has ended."
Officials are planning to auction off parts of the rail track. One willing buyer is Joseph Khoo, a 29-year-old businessman who used to receive his father at the station after his travels to Malaysia.
"It will be a nice gift for my parents as their silver wedding anniversary is coming up," he said.
"Most of all, I will miss the central location of the station. Since the train comes all the way into the heart of Singapore, there was hardly a need for me to navigate my way around," said Ann Chia, 54, who lives in Malaysia and often took the train to visit her sister in Singapore.
Chia was one of the hundreds of people who have crowded the Tanjong Pagar station this week to take a last look at its Neoclassical and Art-Deco architecture. The station was built in 1932 when Singapore and Malaysia formed the British colony known as Malaya.
The two countries separated in 1965, but Malaysia held on to the station and the land on which the tracks ran, from Tanjong Pagar up to the border.
Last year, Malaysia agreed to hand over the railway land in return for six plots in Singapore to be controlled by M-S Pte. Ltd. – a venture 60 per cent owned by Malaysian state investment fund Khazanah Nasional Bhd and 40 per cent owned by Singapore's Temasek Holdings Ltd.
A new station was built in Woodlands on the edge of the city-state near the causeway that links it to the Malaysian state of Johor.
The titular head of Johor, Sultan Ibrahim, will drive the last train that will depart Tanjong Pagar at 10pm. He obtained a train engineer's license last year. All seats on the train were sold out.
Although it will no longer be in service, the train station – with its 72-foot (20-meter) ceiling over the central hall and tiled wall murals – will be preserved as a national monument.
"I first took the train into Tanjong Pagar with my husband when we got married. We wanted to start a new life together in Singapore, and I remembered thinking how grand the station looked when the train first pulled in!" said Choo Gek Hwa, a 73-year-old Malaysian.
"When I heard about the fate of the station, I felt that part of me had closed too," said Choo, whose husband has died. "We even took wedding photos at Tanjong Pagar Railway station and now that it is closed, it feels like a chapter of my life has ended."
Officials are planning to auction off parts of the rail track. One willing buyer is Joseph Khoo, a 29-year-old businessman who used to receive his father at the station after his travels to Malaysia.
"It will be a nice gift for my parents as their silver wedding anniversary is coming up," he said.
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