Victorian RRL (Regional Rail Link)

[MelbourneCity]

It appears as if the Regional Rail Link may have escaped the axe today, but the new government has shelved other Transport Plan projects including the Metro tunnel.

I wonder what changes will be made to the Regional Rail Link - I'd imagine there may be a case put forward for extra capacity to be provided as per the Transport Plan between Footscray and Southern Cross.

[L2]

RRL & the Metro tunnel are both useless cos neither go to Laburnum

And sif I want to go from my palace those places

[Eco-rat]

Originally Posted by John_Proctor

why bother making it a full circle?

why not just extend the Box Hill short starts in tunnel to Doncaster and Greensbourough then through to the city.

gives you the outer part of the circle. The west richmond to Richmond station bit is more difficult as you are taking City access away for 1 line. I suppose you would quad from Clifton Hill to West Richmond and take either Epping or Hurstbridge connected through to the Sandringham Line?

another option could be to quad to say reservoir on the Epping Line and then run Hurstbridge and outer Epping commuters to the loop and the Reservoir line to Sandringham.

Ah, JP, fantasies are always just that. Dreams are free. I wouldn't duplicate from Clifton Hill though, you know me. I believe in people changing trains.

I'll do a set of fantasy lines. Do we have a proper thread for them?

[Eco-rat]

Originally Posted by MelbourneCity

It appears as if the Regional Rail Link may have escaped the axe today, but the new government has shelved other Transport Plan projects including the Metro tunnel.

I wonder what changes will be made to the Regional Rail Link - I'd imagine there may be a case put forward for extra capacity to be provided as per the Transport Plan between Footscray and Southern Cross.

Not sorry the metro tunnel has been dumped. They could have done a lot better.

I was working on it the other day. If the Loop has four tunnels, 3 minute headways and a standard operating pattern, and a generously light 700 per train, that's 14000 per loop or 56000 pax per hour. If we gut the trains so they hold 1000 per set, that's 80,000 pax per hour.

Can someone please explain why we need more capacity than that into the existing CBD grid?

The constraints are outside the loop - yet digging holes in the ground seems to be the main preoccupation of the pollies and the bureaucrats at DoT.

[jarf]

Originally Posted by Eco-rat

I'll do a set of fantasy lines. Do we have a proper thread for them?

Sure do. http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=815854

[MelbourneCity]

Originally Posted by Eco-rat

The constraints are outside the loop - yet digging holes in the ground seems to be the main preoccupation of the pollies and the bureaucrats at DoT.

People see the holes etc because its a new project etc. Adding track just isn't as exciting as WHOLE new systems.

I'd like to see what the government offer up as their solution.

Surely 4 tracks to Mordialloc, Westall (if not Dandenong) are on the priority list, as should be an extra track to Box Hill, with 3rd to Blackburn (though obviously not as high priority as the Caulfield lines).

[John_Proctor]

Originally Posted by Eco-rat

Not sorry the metro tunnel has been dumped. They could have done a lot better.

I was working on it the other day. If the Loop has four tunnels, 3 minute headways and a standard operating pattern, and a generously light 700 per train, that's 14000 per loop or 56000 pax per hour. If we gut the trains so they hold 1000 per set, that's 80,000 pax per hour.

Can someone please explain why we need more capacity than that into the existing CBD grid?

The constraints are outside the loop - yet digging holes in the ground seems to be the main preoccupation of the pollies and the bureaucrats at DoT.

that stuff is already happening. at the moment there are 110ish trains into the CBD in morning peak using every train available to the operator. as more trains are bought and in service more services are being run.

using you 20 tph (3 minute headway) on the 6 'through tracks' (4 loop and 2 viaduct) you could run 120 tph in peak + platform capacity at FSS and SXS. upping that to 24tph gets you another 24 tph.

Lets say its allocated as follows:
- 24 Ringwood loop
- 24 Dandenong loop
- 24 Clifton Hill loop
- 24 Craigieburn/Upfield loop
- 24 (per direction) Footscray (note that would be 24 tph for Melton/Sunbury/Werribee/Laverton/Williamstown) - Frankston/Sandringham viaduct
- 20 Glen Waverley/Blackburn direct to FSS

that is 164 trains which is an uplift of 35% from current peak hour trains.

lets say in the next 10 years we get continued 5% annual growth in patronage (helped by the fact you actually run TUAG type train services) that is 50% growth (not bothering to compound) from current 'crowded' services. That would suggest you'd want 50% + more trains than current service levels and potentially some track augmentation/new projects.

options are either
- lesser outcome 'basic' changes like sending Upfields direct to SXS and terminating with say 10tph each to give you some additional capcaity for Craigieburns. Sending Sandringham direct to FSS to give more capacity to Frankston.
- spending money on a major project that will come online in 2020 to provide additional capacity. the biggest squeeze is probably the northern loop lines and wouldn't you know it that is what Melbourne Metro proposes to alleviate!

CoM has 650,000 daily visitors. majority of those are workers/uni students who want access in and around peak hour. providing capacity for 25% of the total to enter the CBD (from multiple directions and to multiple places) makes sense... kind of like how your fantasy map in another thread has a line down Royal Parade, or splits the City Loop up into through routes to double its capacity!

[Eco-rat]

Originally Posted by John_Proctor

that stuff is already happening. at the moment there are 110ish trains into the CBD in morning peak using every train available to the operator. as more trains are bought and in service more services are being run.

using you 20 tph (3 minute headway) on the 6 'through tracks' (4 loop and 2 viaduct) you could run 120 tph in peak + platform capacity at FSS and SXS. upping that to 24tph gets you another 24 tph.

Lets say its allocated as follows:
- 24 Ringwood loop
- 24 Dandenong loop
- 24 Clifton Hill loop
- 24 Craigieburn/Upfield loop
- 24 (per direction) Footscray (note that would be 24 tph for Melton/Sunbury/Werribee/Laverton/Williamstown) - Frankston/Sandringham viaduct
- 20 Glen Waverley/Blackburn direct to FSS

that is 164 trains which is an uplift of 35% from current peak hour trains.

lets say in the next 10 years we get continued 5% annual growth in patronage (helped by the fact you actually run TUAG type train services) that is 50% growth (not bothering to compound) from current 'crowded' services. That would suggest you'd want 50% + more trains than current service levels and potentially some track augmentation/new projects.

options are either
- lesser outcome 'basic' changes like sending Upfields direct to SXS and terminating with say 10tph each to give you some additional capcaity for Craigieburns. Sending Sandringham direct to FSS to give more capacity to Frankston.
- spending money on a major project that will come online in 2020 to provide additional capacity. the biggest squeeze is probably the northern loop lines and wouldn't you know it that is what Melbourne Metro proposes to alleviate!

CoM has 650,000 daily visitors. majority of those are workers/uni students who want access in and around peak hour. providing capacity for 25% of the total to enter the CBD (from multiple directions and to multiple places) makes sense... kind of like how your fantasy map in another thread has a line down Royal Parade, or splits the City Loop up into through routes to double its capacity!

JP I ask again. Is the 'squeeze' you describe a passenger squeeze, or a train squeeze??? ie does the system have congestion due to passengers, or due to trains??

Does FSS to SXS actually merit 6 tracks in terms of passengers - rather than trains??

Why do you show all these stupid Western lines that really shouldn't have direct access to the city eg Altona or Willytown, or lines that are managing well enough thank you very much out of SXS like Melton?

Why do you quote 'platform capacity' at FSS when this has been deliberately and wantonly downgraded in the last 15 years?? And what has that to do with demand for travel to FSS? Edit: Remember, FSS should be designed around the number of people who want to go there, not as some symbolic 'centre' of the network, because some gunzels wet their pants at the idea of this big central station. That station is now SXS, and FSS is just a wayside station.

I have never said that you never ever need to dig more tunnels in the CBD - I have said you don't need to to accommodate the foreseeable demand levels.

If, OTOH, you actually want to IMPROVE the coverage of the network, to cover more demand (currently serviced by road transport) or to have several million more people in Melbourne (which I support) then by all means, dig those tunnels.

But in that case, why pretend the Eddingtunnel is the best option?

The worst congestion I see is not between North Melbourne and Flinders St (far from it - there are relatively few passengers going that way, so why dig another tunnel?) It is an unnecessary number of train movements, caused by shallow thinking, cumbersome industrial agreements and reckless removal of track.

And you never refuted my hypothetical of the X-class hauled wheatie dying at Harcourt, blocking the Bendigo line and its effect recocheting all the way to poor old Domain underground station.

Because no serious attempt to quarantine your lovely new underground line from the same existing VR malaise which has been with us for well over 100 years.

[L2]

Originally Posted by Eco-rat

Does FSS to SXS actually merit 6 tracks in terms of passengers - rather than trains??

Interesting thing to look at actually - ie take afternoon peak. 3 of 6 tracks are carrying primarily outbound pax through to eastern lines, people who have no need to travel along that section of track. Half the people who get on at Fss do so only because they know it saves them from standing from Parliament to Noble Park or Reservoir or something.

In the morning 2 of 6 are used for trains arriving from lines thru Richmond that have already dumped most pax at the other 4 CBD stations. How many people actually stay on these to FSS?? In all of my commuting I have only ever done it once (on the first train of the morning that was).

Also congesting that segment is all the empty cars movements to/from the North Melb yards which are quite substantial in peak hour

[John_Proctor]

JP I ask again. Is the 'squeeze' you describe a passenger squeeze, or a train squeeze??? ie does the system have congestion due to passengers, or due to trains??

You are correct there is currently a train squeeze. many lines due to being underserviced by trains run at 1000+ people on a 800 'capacity' train. This has come about due to average nearly 10% rail patronage growth since mid noughties. So to get back to the current 'capacity' of a train you would need to run 20% more trains to go from 1000 to 800 people. that eats up some of your 'spare' train capacity on the network while only making the 'passenger squeeze' back to comfortable. and that is in TODAYS terms which leads too...

If, OTOH, you actually want to IMPROVE the coverage of the network, to cover more demand (currently serviced by road transport) or to have several million more people in Melbourne (which I support) then by all means, dig those tunnels.

exactly! Melbourne grew by about 75,000 people last year so by the time the eddingtunnel would open at that rate of growth there be another 750,000 peopel in the city. Melbourne reaches 5 million on much lower growth rates than what I just quoted by 2026. the people are coming and most of them will be housed in the North and West (craigieburn, sunbury, melton, caroline springs, wyndham) which have much more remaining developable land than the south east (pakenham, office, cranbourne). So do we let the north/west lines that service growth areas (being Sunbury/Melton/Werribee) continue to have only 2 tracks into the city or not?

But in that case, why pretend the Eddingtunnel is the best option?

Lets say we build ECO's Royal Parade Upfield Line instead of eddingtunnel... what does that do to provide additional capacity across the northern group from today??? BUGGER ALL it removes three trains from the northern loop. still only two tracks to serve Craigieburn, Sunbury and Werribee (by all means run willi, laverton, melton as shuttles but that doesn't change that you need to provide for the 250,000 people that will live on those lines in 10 years on the mainline services) even at a good service level of 24tph per track you are looking at 48 in total or 50,000 per hour for CBD access for a population of 1.5 million people.

and while we're talking about the Hartcourt wheat train fucking up the Eddingtunnel (very unlikely) how about one of those 48 trains fucking up the operation of 3 lines instead of one by virtue of the trains mixing in traffic to get the capacity needed for each line... maybe 8 loop craigieburns, 16 loop Sunburies, 8 viaduct craigieburns (bypassing NM on the grade sep) and 16 viaduct Werribees.

[Melb_aviator]

The fact is that something needs to be done now, not in 15 years time, especially for the North and West. The RRL will help solve a few capacity issues that we currently have but theres a long way to go. I would like to see the possibility of a Newport-Fishermans Bend/Port Melbourne-City rail tunnel coming along, with this fitting in well with the new govts planning goals. The area will need a catalyst to develop, and this could work in well with that. The only issue is the terminating point of such a route, but that could be worked out easily enough.

I liked the tunnel proposal, given its ability to open up the Arden and Parkville areas for more connectivity/development, but deared that it would always just end at the Domain Interchange, with very little chance of the next link to Caulfied being built.

Something needs to be done, as it was needed yesterday, not in the distant future. The west also still needs a 2nd Yarra road crossing, which Westlink had a chance of achieving, however it needed to go through to the Eastern freeway, with exits at Footscray Road, Hoddle Street and maybe one near Royal Park to have any chance of being a success.

All this costs money, and to build it comes government debt and risk, which would likely see cutting of services, possible tolls and private ownership and/or a NIMBY riot

[kichigai]

http://www.urbanalyst.com/in-the-new...rail-link.html

Shortlisted builders announced for Regional Rail Link
In the News - Victoria

THREE consortiums have been shortlisted as potential builders for the new passenger rail line between Deer Park and West Werribee, as part of the $4.3 billion Regional Rail Link.

Federal Infrastructure and Transport Minister Anthony Albanese today said the short-listing of potential builders for this section of the Regional Rail Link is another major milestone in the delivery of what is the country's biggest public transport infrastructure project. The shortlisted consortiums are:

* Abigroup Thiess JV;
* Fulton Hogan, John Holland & Coleman Rail JV; and
* Leighton Baulderstone JV.

"Each of these joint ventures will now be invited to develop and submit fully costed proposals, with the final contract expected to be awarded to one of them in late 2011," Mr Albanese said.

"Once completed in 2014, the Regional Rail Link will become metropolitan Melbourne's first major new rail line in 80 years, providing capacity for up to 9,000 additional passengers during peak hour."

The Regional Rail Link is a jointly funded project, with the Australian Government contributing $3.2 billion and the Victorian Government providing $1.1 billion.

Victorian Public Transport Minister Terry Mulder said the successful consortium will be required to lay 25 kilometres of new track separating Geelong trains from metropolitan trains and removing a major cause of congestion and delays.

"They will also be tasked with building new stations at Wyndham Vale and Tarneit as well as a bridge over the Werribee River and grade separations including the Deer Park Bypass so as to avoid the need for any new level crossings," said Mr Mulder.

"The Regional Rail Link's Deer Park to West Werribee section will provide vital new train services to Melbourne's growing west along with improved capacity and reliability for Geelong services."

[John_Proctor]

"Each of these joint ventures will now be invited to develop and submit fully costed proposals, with the final contract expected to be awarded to one of them in late 2011," Mr Albanese said.

how will it take another nearly 12 months to appoint the preferreed of thse 3 contractors! no wonder projects cost so much! this section (West Werribee to Deer Park) is the easiest to define part of the entire route and here we are 18 months after the funding was provided for the project and they still think it'll be another 12 months before some construction is commenced! ridiculous.

[John_Proctor]

The fact is that something needs to be done now, not in 15 years time, especially for the North and West. The RRL will help solve a few capacity issues that we currently have but theres a long way to go. I would like to see the possibility of a Newport-Fishermans Bend/Port Melbourne-City rail tunnel coming along, with this fitting in well with the new govts planning goals.

RRL buys you time to build these projects but these projects take time. you can't design,fund, build,test,commision a tunnel 'now' building the Eddingtunnel will take 8-10 years from today and its had work completed over the last 3 years from Eddington to the DOT.

The Newport tunnel would take even longer as it is unplanned/designed and probably going throuhg more difficult ground conditions (under hte mouth of the yarra, through dodgy soils in Fishermens Bend, under the yarra again to get to the city and under docklands)

timescale for building a tunnel:
year 1 - strategic justification for route
year 2 - concept development on route
year 3 - commence planning approval and continue concept development
year 4 - finalise planning approval and concept development, develop commercial model and tender documents
year 5 - land aquisition, and tendering of project (call for expressions of interest etc), early works (service relocations)
year 6 - land held and selection of preferred tenderer, early works (procure tunnel boring machine, demolish buildings on land, detailed design, mobilise team)
year 7 - tunnel boring machines delivered (mid year at best) and start doing 20m per day boring, lots of consturction sites across city
year 8 - tunnel boring continues, station box construction continues
year 9 - tunnel boring and station box construction end, station fit out commences, tunnel fit out (track, signals) commences
year 10 - fit out finalised testing commences
year 11 - operating trains ready to roll.

[James]

That said John, there are ways to squeeze in more capacity until Eddingtunnel is complete, and potentially defer it for a few years. This assumes that the RRL additional tracks.

firstly. Take the glen waverly, Upfield and Frankston lines completely out of the loop + some cragieburn trains.

Upfield line can take one platform out of Southern Cross (gives an additional 3tph to Northern Loop).

Glen Waverly Line can take two platforms at Flinders Street, provides an additional 6-8tph for the Burnley loop, and also enables a higher frequency on the Glen Waverly Line (could take some overflow from the Dandenong Line).

Frankston - Newport Lines enables for 6-8tph to be taken out of the loop on the Caulfield loop.

There is an additional 21tph train paths.
You could also increase capacity of the Northern loop by running some Cragieburn line trains direct (utilising the flyover) and through running those into Sandringham or terminating them at Flinders Street.


You would end up with something along the lines of

Northern Loop
4tph Upfield - Southern Cross
8tph Cragieburn - City Loop
12tph Sydenham - City Loop
4tph Broadmeadows - Flinders Street
12tph Newport - Frankston (determine what line is the shuttle later)

Clifton Hill Group - no change - some additional trains can be put in if required.

Burnley Group
10tph Lilydale - City Loop
10tph Blackburn/Box Hill - City Loop
4tph Belgrave - Ringwood
4tph Alamein - Camberwell

Caulfield Group
20tph Dandenong Line
12tph Frankston line
10tph Sandringham line


Limiting this is the lack of trainsets - you'd need a lot more trains.

[John_Proctor]

Current Northern Group peak 1 hour service levels

9 Sydenham
10 Werribee
10 Craigieburn
3 Upfield

you propose to add 8 tph to that. or 25% growth in services. given the Northern Group is consistently the most over-crowded you are really just relieving the current over-crowding on the line. better signalling could let you get up to 24tph per track so you'd be able to add another 12 to that to get up to 52 total from the west or about 70% increase from now... and that is when the squeeze hits circa population and patronage growth from the west.

the growth that I've quoted has been more like 10-15% growth on Sydenham, Craigieburn, and Werribee lines per year over 5 years with lower growth on the 'established' suburbs lines like Fraknston, and Burnley Group. so 10 years growth at 10-15% = need for 100% more trains and a new track pair.

out of interest as I'm not 100% familar with specific track layouts - can you run Upfields to Southern Cross and Back without having a cross over of trains entering/leaving the Northern Loop Tunnel - and is there spare platform capacity in SXS to provide for Upfields? (ie. that would be a 'free' project if both of the answers are yes. if it isn't you are looking at a $200 million to buidl a crossover, create platform space and play around with track layouts in the north melborune yards.

[James]

Originally Posted by John_Proctor

Current Northern Group peak 1 hour service levels

9 Sydenham
10 Werribee
10 Craigieburn
3 Upfield

you propose to add 8 tph to that. or 25% growth in services. given the Northern Group is consistently the most over-crowded you are really just relieving the current over-crowding on the line. better signalling could let you get up to 24tph per track so you'd be able to add another 12 to that to get up to 52 total from the west or about 70% increase from now... and that is when the squeeze hits circa population and patronage growth from the west.

out of interest as I'm not 100% familar with specific track layouts - can you run Upfields to Southern Cross and Back without having a cross over of trains entering/leaving the Northern Loop Tunnel - and is there spare platform capacity in SXS to provide for Upfields? (ie. that would be a 'free' project if both of the answers are yes. if it isn't you are looking at a $200 million to buidl a crossover, create platform space and play around with track layouts in the north melborune yards.

It should be possible, and take over the southern most platform (it assumes that the Latrobe valley Services use the southern V/line platforms/Flinders St)



Ok. i did this as a very rough linear analysis for you. I know there is a tonne of holes in this, but its to show the basic premise.

I assumed that 40% (80% of all trips in 5 hours, and 90% of all trips in 7hours) of all trips happen during the 2 hour morning peak (whcih is the busiest point on the transport network - nominally you allocate 20% for the roads in this period)

I'm analysing this more as if it was a road network

in 2009 there was the following breakdown of trips per day for the various lines

Line 2009 2009 peak

Cragieburn 26k 10k
Sydenham 26k 10k
Werribee 42k 17k
Upfield 13k 5k

Please note the following on these figures which do skew them slightly
Sydenham includes the sunbury and melton lines.
Werribee includes Footscray as 100% of total (assumes none to sydenham for simplifcation of apportioning trips)


If we assume a 5% growth to the line each year until 2030 we end up with the following figures:

Line 2009 2009 peak

Cragieburn 72k 28k
Sydenham 72k 28k
Werribee 116k 46k
Upfield 36k 7k

This means that the minimum level of service required (with 1k per train is)

Cragieburn 14 trains
Sydenham 14 trains
Werribee 23 trains
Upfield 7 trains


The network capacity in 2030 could be assumed to be (with signalling upgrades)

City Loop 26-30tph
Viaduct Tracks - 26-30tph
Southern Cross Platform 6-8tph.

This would then enable for a service of:

24tph - Werribee
16tph - Sydenham
16tph - Cragieburn (4-6tph via viaduct)
8tph - Upfield.

which would bring us to 28-30tph through the loop (2 patterns, 2 destinations)
28-30tph along the viaduct
8tph terminating at a single platform at Southern Cross.

This would just provide enough capacity assuming 40% travelling in this period. I've deliberately made it high - In reality it should be closer to 30%.

[John_Proctor]

but the above is all based on running a system at the limits of its capacity...

its fine to say the city loop or the viaduct can handle 28-30 tph with a signalling upgrade but that necessitates upgrading of signalling right up the line, power upgrades, and probably removing all level crossings to get to something remotely approaching relability as you approach system capacity.

If you are getting to 28-30 on each line (which I agree is conservate assuming 40% peak load, BUT your suggestion of 5% annual growth on lines that have historically been higher may be underplaying growth) I would suggest you'd be better off going to 3 lines at that point in time at the latest (leave Upfield dircet to SXS) so the day one changover is running your
24tph - Werribee (Viaduct)
16tph - Sydenham (New line - eddingtunnel)
16tph - Cragieburn (Loop)

you then have a much more reliability on the network and you have the ability to cater for growth from 2020-2030/40. example building Eddingtunnel allows you to Electrify to Melton and run 24tph through the Eddingtunnel 8 from Melton, 16 from Sydenham/Sunbury. It also allows you to run more to Craigieburn (or even to return Upfield to the Loop).

[Eco-rat]

Originally Posted by John_Proctor

You are correct there is currently a train squeeze. many lines due to being underserviced by trains run at 1000+ people on a 800 'capacity' train. This has come about due to average nearly 10% rail patronage growth since mid noughties. So to get back to the current 'capacity' of a train you would need to run 20% more trains to go from 1000 to 800 people. that eats up some of your 'spare' train capacity on the network while only making the 'passenger squeeze' back to comfortable. and that is in TODAYS terms which leads too...

Sorry JP - you're not hearing what I'm saying. I don't want us to be 2 deaf men shouting at each other.

The Sydney Rd underground is not about improving capacity for the existing North and West network. It might have a marginal effect by giving three paths per hour currently used for Upfield. The Sydney Rd underground is about getting a whole new stream of pax who currently use the Tulla or Sydney Rd, they drive, they cause congestion, they make Sydney Rd unusable.

This, BTW,is what the Upfield line is supposed to do anyway, but doesn't, but I digress.

I would rather build it than Eddingtunnel if the aim is to get NEW passengers, not just the existing market, which you seem wedded to.

And that comes back to the cognitive bias that pollies and bureaucrats exhibit - they are only worried about what current pax (or likely pax) think of the service, not the other 90% of the pop.

Do you REALLY think the City Loop is full of PASSENGERS?? I ask again, PASSENGERS? Do you really think trains between FSS and SXS on FOUR separate tracks are BURSTING WITH PASSENGERS? No,of course not.

Do you really think FSS or SXS themselves are at peak historic capacity? I mean pax flowing out the gates. No, of course they aren't.

If capacity was so important, why did they close four platforms at FSS in the last 15 years?

Why have they ripped up trackwork that would deal with TRAIN (rather than PASSENGER) congestion you refer to?

Rather than mixing your trains through Northern Loop, as you seem to want to do, why not run only one of the lines through it, make everyone else change? Please don't dodge this one.

I agree with your post on some respects. Yes, the Werribee trains are getting fuller as that side of town fills up with people. Yes, the Melton line could probably do with duplication and maybe even electrification (though you could run Vline a LOT harder before that becomes necessary, for example, 8 car loco hauled double deck stock could be ordered and run Melton, Caroline Springs, Sunshine and Footscray therefore only 2 electric stations need modificatoin).

I don't doubt the TRAIN load is getting congested around Footscray and North Melbourne the way they run the system now. Have they done everything they could with the PASSENGER load? Ripped out the seats (no, they haven't. Why is that?) Got rid of the intermediate driving compartments and coupled them permanently as 6 cars? (no, why is that?)

And it's all very well to complain about the signal upgrade being required, some lines have had their signals upgraded many times over, yet left at the same pathetic headway each time.

Weren't Moorabin to Caulfield, Box Hill to Richmond, the Footscray quad resignalled when they were amplified? Why wasn't the headway improved then? When the Loop was built - the loop can take 2 minute headways, why not the lines that fed it?

Westall is being resignalled as we speak. Are they improving headways through there?

As for the wheat train, I don't think you really get it. If a small number of commuters who are marginal about catching the train or driving to work, turn up at Domain, the serviuce is fucked, there's no information about what's going on, the drivers are saying "don't blame us" and the Minister locks himself in that awful blue building on Exhibition St and won't come out, guess what...they'll be driving from now on, and telling all their friends why.

And that is something that DOESN'T happen in HK, or Tokyo, or Stockholm or wherever.

At the end of the day you keep describing to me a culture of transport bureaucracy which sees itself as the victim - victim of trends, victim of treasury, victim of malign media, victim of odd coincidences and rare incidents, rather than positioning itself on the front foot. Fighting road transport, becoming a genuine world leader rather than also-ran. Keeping ahead of trends.

And no, I don't mean building Eddingtunnel as a way of keeping ahead of trends. I mean thinking about things like Peak Oil, like areas cut off from all trade and commerce, not just a peak hour commute.

[Eco-rat]

Originally Posted by John_Proctor

but the above is all based on running a system at the limits of its capacity...

its fine to say the city loop or the viaduct can handle 28-30 tph with a signalling upgrade but that necessitates upgrading of signalling right up the line, power upgrades, and probably removing all level crossings to get to something remotely approaching relability as you approach system capacity.

Again, I don't see the problem. You want to build a bloody great hole in the ground rather than fix what has needed fixing for decades.


As has been pointed out at length:

• sydney has got rid of its crossings methodically over the same period
• wiring, track, power and signals are constantly being 'maintained' across the system, at which point they could be upgraded instead, same personnel, same track occupations. Bit by bit, line by line
• the best cure for unreliability is to stop traffic mixing, which means tracks like the City Loop should not be shared, but passengers should change trains
• And that would be easier if they don't have to get off their seats, because most of them have been removed.