SkyscraperCity Forum banner

Perth Metronet: FAL, TCL, MEL, Line Extensions & Grade Separations

627K views 4K replies 270 participants last post by  M103 
#1 ·
There's been a bit of discussion in the Perth forums lately about making a thread here regarding Perth's urban transit. Alas, most of us are lazy, so I thought I'd give it a go. Transperth oversees the runnings of the public transit system, and unlike a lot of other capital cities, the entire system is publicly owned. Perth's ticketing is largely based around the SmartRider, which works on all forms of public transport. 170,500 people ride the train system alone every day.



At the moment, the rail system currently has 5 lines, all named after their respective destinations (Fremantle, Thornlie, Armadale, Clarkson and Midland). When the Mandurah line is finished, there will be 6 lines and the entire size of the network will have been doubled. Plans are also in the works to create a new line to the International Airport in the East of the city. Our Planning and Infrastructure minister wants the domestic and international terminals to merge (as the domestic terminal can't currently handle the amount of traffic it takes) and for the line to be constructed within 5 to 10 years. The options are to either build the line under the airport, have the line follow the airport boundaries before entering to the south, or connect it to a possible light rail system.





Construction of the Mandurah line involved:
* 81.5 route kilometres and 163 track kilometres of narrow gauge railway
* 2.8 million cubic metres of earthworks
* 252,000 concrete sleepers
* 15,200 tonnes of 50kg rail track
* 650 tonnes of 60kg rail track
* 22 kilometres of slab track
* 145,000 cubic metres of ballast
* 1,690 precast concrete masts
* 163,000 cubic metres of concrete with 22,300 tonnes of reinforcement
* 20 bridges and structures
* 15 stations
* 5,400 car bays
* 40 lifts
* 40 escalators
* 3 electrical feeder stations (25KV a.c power)

Needless to say, the MetroRail is a massive piece of infrastructure.
Here's a few pictures/spiel about it. Addition information can be found at
http://www.newmetrorail.wa.gov.au
A video regarding the entire project can be found at:
http://www.newmetrorail.wa.gov.au/NMR/video/Video_NMR_web.wmv (7min 42sec)

The new william st platforms:




The platforms are under this building, which has just started construction:
one40william.


There'll also be a connection to this building that's going up
Raine Sq.


With the completion of the underground station, new developments will begin on the train yards beside Perth Central.


It's all got to do with the whole TOD mindset, which the WA government has become a big fan of. They want to make the city easily accessible, and hide the rail lines with new, eco friendly, dynamic developments.

Esplanade Station is also underground, when it's completed, it will provide transport to the proposed foreshore development as well as the PCEC.


Renders of the Western Foreshore:








Latest Article:

Next step to Perth’s foreshore development


12/5/07

The State Government has committed $2million to advance the Mounts Bay development which will transform the Swan River foreshore into an entertainment and tourist hub.

Over the past three years, urban designers from the Department for Planning and Infrastructure have done extensive traffic modelling and urban planning to develop the proposal.

Planning and Infrastructure Minister Alannah MacTiernan announced the seed funding that would allow LandCorp to proceed with the next stages of the proposal including:

detailed geo-technical study on ground conditions;
developing the final plan through community consultation;
obtaining planning approvals; and
developing the business case for stages of the development.

“Mounts Bay has the potential to become one of the most significant tourism projects ever undertaken in Western Australia,” Ms MacTiernan said.

“This is a unique opportunity to work towards creating a vibrant new precinct on the under-utilised river foreshore and enhancing Perth’s image as a world-class capital city.

“We want to include a mixture of public spaces, hotels, apartments, offices, restaurants, cafes, bars and shops that would ensure Mounts Bay is a living, breathing place beyond city office hours and peak tourism periods.”

The Minister said the studies undertaken by LandCorp would include a detailed assessment of the site conditions to firm-up costs of the proposal prior to the 2008 State Budget discussions.

The first stage of the project would focus on the William Street corridor from Mounts Bay Road to the river and the waterfront between William Street and Barrack Square.

Perth Lord Mayor Dr Peter Nattrass said Mounts Bay had the potential to reconnect Perth with the Swan River foreshore.

“The importance of this site demands that the right balance is reached in developing along the river, while maintaining its natural beauty,” Dr Nattrass said.

Ms MacTiernan said broad community engagement on the design would commence during the planning process.

“The Government is delighted with the support already shown for this project by the City of Perth, business community, the tourism industry and the wider community since initial concepts were made public recently,” she said.
http://www.mediastatements.wa.gov.au/media/media.nsf
The government's also planning a light rail system for Perth, as it's desperately needed. The proposal's gaining momentum as it all fits in nicely with the government's 'Network City' plan, so I think we might just get it. At the moment our Mayor is in Canberra asking for the money to do it (along with all the other lord mayors who are also asking for money) -considering that Perth holds a lot of marginal seats, he really should cough up the cash.

I'll leave it to the other Perf forumers to carry on from what I've started...
 
See less See more
11
#165 ·
The bodies are built by Volgren to the standard CR228L design. Volgren's main factory is at Dandenong in Melbourne with a second Perth factory and Brisbane Transport builds their own using parts/design from Volgren. Theres a lot of these running around Melbourne too, and a few in Sydney.

It's also good to see I'm not the only one who steals Todd Milton's photos!
 
#166 ·
BT are the only bus company that actually builds its own buses. The CR228L body design is a very good one, and should be purchased in their hundreds. Beats a Bustech VST (not that you WA boys would know what that is). As for QR 30 min off peak frequency, it is the greatest pain of our network, to be honest there might be a middle man between 1/2 hour expresses from say caboolture/ipswich with more frequent all stoppers. Or even 20 minute frequency before heading to the 15 min freq. For some reason TL has something against the number 20. Its either 15 or 30.

But back to TransPerth, the network over there is expanding at a great rate of knots, and I hope to get over there one day to check it all out first hand. Pity a ticket from Brissy to Perth is not a cheap prospect. Where's Jetstar & Tiger on BNE - PER.
 
#181 ·
BT are the only bus company that actually builds its own buses. The CR228L body design is a very good one, and should be purchased in their hundreds.
The Grenda Group owns Volgren, the maker of the body design you mention, and owns several bus companies, which BroadGauge has listed above. :)

Bad aircon isn't much of a problem for me, my regular routes are Grendas' flagship routes which always have new buses running. :D

Seat design is something a bit too trivial for me though. Having an ugly or hard seat is better than having no seat, especially when trying to squeeze out of the front doorway and into the aisle so the bus can actually depart.
 
#167 ·
Do these have cushioning seats? Much prefer the soft cushioning seats the much older buses had. The newer buses feel like your sitting in a genetic seat mould, straight from the plastics factory ..plus I can't breath on these buses. The driver determines whether to turn on the air conditioning (oxygen) and to what level he feels most comfortable at it seems.
 
#169 ·
nah same seats, although they are hell for me, cause they have a funny mould, but built for the average sized person. I'm 194cm rofl, I don't fit, hurts my back :(

As for the temperature control, I wonder sometimes if its automatic, cause one second its nice air coming out, then its freezing cold, then warm. weird, no bus driver would be that retarded lol.
 
#168 ·
At least you have modern air cond buses. Here in Melbourne we have 18yr old MAN SL200s like this one still with the original air conditioning. When it works its only a slight breeze - but one of my worst experiences was on a sticky summers night when I caught one with the air conditioning not working. Absolutely awful. Thankfully we don't use them at night anymore.
 
#171 ·
I can see coloured fabric in that bus pic ?
I want windows that open I think.. but once upon a time I hated them. If the person in front had theirs opened, it would mess with my hair :p..But I'm not so 'conscious with that issue any more these days.
I seriously sometimes find it hard to breath on these buses..and start cursing the driver..then hope for someone to get off so the door would open and let some 'real' air in...Then I hate when people get off because you just want to get to your destination..No win situation ..Anyway, I do catch cabs more so these days if I can't drive... Maybe I just a fuken whinger ?:lol:
 
#176 ·
My freind who is still at school said a few weeks ago he hopped on a brand new bus that had started that very day, said it felt like a brand new car and had that good smell. Anyway he goes on to tell me how a window near the back opened. I too hate the fact that the windows don't open to it was good news to me that the newest fleet of buses had 2 windows that opened.

LOL It also pisses me off when people get on and off. I hated coming home from school for this very reason. My home was at most 10 min on the bus so I guess i'm just a whingy bitch too :p
 
#182 ·
What route is that? The only routes that don't regularly get older buses are 888/889 and 900, and from time to time even those will have an old Volvo B10M running on them.
 
#183 · (Edited)
BroadGauge said:
That is the standard Grenda Group interior, and they own Transitplus.
Transitplus is 50% owned by ATE (of which 50% is owned by each of the Grenda Group and the Hornibrook Group, meaning 25% of Transitplus each) and 50% is owned by TransAdelaide.

PATH Transit and SouthLink are also owned by ATE, meaning the Grenda Group only owns 50% of each. ;)

(Also, the Kefford Group used to own an equal third of ATE before it sold its share equally to Grenda and Hornibrook.)
 
#184 ·
This is the only bus interior I've seen out of the other ones that were posted. You can tell that the other ones must have been taken out of service so long ago.



If you get on a bus in Perth, you'll either see this interior, or something better like the Hydrogen bus interiors.
 
#189 ·
city_thing said:
This is the only bus interior I've seen out of the other ones that were posted. You can tell that the other ones must have been taken out of service so long ago.
Out of the interiors posted, they're all still in service. It's probably just that your route only gets low-floor buses.

When I lived in Redcliffe for two months in 2006, the Renaults I almost always got on route 39 had the second interior above. ;)
 
#191 ·
Seriously, out of all the buses I've been on in Perth (and that's a lot, I don't own a car) I've never seen 2 or those interiors. Route 39 goes past my bus stop, it's now one of the modern buses. As is 95% of every other route.
 
#193 ·
that second one city_thing just posted, there are still some of those around, VERY rare though. A few years ago there were still quite a few, and at the beggining of this year they were stilll running them on the 866 down the freeway, we'd be chugging along at 60km/h, would take forever to get anywhere.
 
#197 ·
Still plenty of Mercedes O305s in Perth (the first two pics), my friend was whinging about getting them. They are common on 414 and 867 in particular apparently.

Also plenty of Renault PR100.2s as in the third pic too.
 
Top