History of the Causeway

The history of the causeway started in 1909 when the Johor State Railway to Johor Bahru was completed. The connection to Singapore, then the administrative headquarters of British interests in South-East Asia, was via ferry.

Singapore was then serving as the entrepot for the rest of Malaya which included the Federated Malay States (FMS), the Straits Settlements of Penang and Malacca, plus the five (Unfederated) Malay States of Johor, Kelantan, Trengganu, Kedah and Perlis.

The ferry to Woodlands was a tedious means of negotiating the Straits of Johor. Only six goods wagons could be loaded on to one ferry. Goods trucks using the ferry service numbered 11,500 in 1911. As the trade in rubber and other primary agricultural commodities and tin increased, this truck convoy grew to 54,000 in 1917, necessitating round the clock operations.

So a decision was made to connect Singapore and Kuala Lumpur with the railway line; in short, the ferry was to be replaced by tracks over a bridge or a causeway.

The design for a causeway by Messrs Coode, Fizmaurice, Wilson and Mitchell of Westminster was adopted and the contract awarded to Topham, Jones & Railton Ltd of London. In December 1919, Herbert Fancott, supervising engineer for the contractor, arrived with a large party of tough navy gangers and set up the first work camp at Woodlands, then considered the "most unhealthy spot in Singapore", with its native occupants of snakes, scorpions and centipedes.

In 1952, on his retirement, Fancott - who came to supervise one project but stayed a lifetime - recalled the "wild days" of the Causeway's construction.

The Causeway was one of the largest engineering projects of its time - 60 feet wide on top for carrying two railway tracks and a 26-feet-wide roadway spanning 3,465 feet from Johor Bahru to Woodlands.

The average depth of the waters was 46 feet and 10 culverts of 5-foot diameter were inserted to prevent accumulation of floating refuse near the lock, built near the Johor side.

It was the incorporation of the electrically operated bridge and lock, which made the Causeway then such an amazing engineering feat for its time. A rolling lift-bridge spanned the lock, elevating the railway and roadway to allow passage of small vessels. The moving parts weighed some 570 tons. This feature was later abandoned as being too disruptive to the increasing traffic across the Causeway.

In addition, the Causeway also carried the water pipelines from the Johor catchment's reservoirs to Singapore and treated water from Singapore to Johor Bahru. Communication wires and cables were also securely built in.

The Causeway cost 17 million Straits dollars, a princely sum in those days, considering that the annual expenditure for the whole colony was $28.3 million in 1924. The undertaking was managed primarily as a FMS Railway project under its general manager, Mr P.A. Anthony who was on the first official journey across the Johor Straits. The cost was reportedly "shared jointly" by the Federated Malay States, Johor and the Straits Settlements.

Extracted from Nuance - Nov, 23, 2003 Article by Yap Yok Foo

This stone was taken from Pulau Ubin (Granite Stone Island) and Bukit Timah in September 1920 and November 1921 for the construction of the Johor Causeway between 1919 and 1923. Hard Hornblende Granites are intrusive rocks that start out as molten masses deep within the earth's crust. As the mass cools, they form into crystals of various sizes and shapes depending on the surrounding temperature. The weight of each stones ranges from 10 cwt to 5 tons. Granites are typically the hardest of the dimensional stones and can withstand many elements well. Due to its natural characteristics, granite was used as cutting tools and as grinders in the earlier days and was also chosen as suitable material for the construction of the Johor Causeway in the 1920s. As a symbolic gesture to the Gerbang Selatan Bersepadu Project, a Johor Causeway muzeum will be built using the stones from the causeway.

"The Johore Causeway" by Donald Paterson, Assoc. M. Inst. C.E., Yr. 1922