Article: City bound for commuter hell

[ozbob]

From the Melbourne Age click here!

City bound for commuter hell

City bound for commuter hell
Deborah Gough
June 19, 2011

WITHIN a decade, Melbourne's already bursting train services will have to accommodate an extra 1 million passenger trips a day.

The forecast, contained in Transport Department documents obtained by The Sunday Age under freedom of information, reveals that average weekday travel on trains will rise from about 800,000 trips to 1.8 million by 2021-22.

This will put unprecedented pressure on the city's beleaguered rail network, which is already costing Melbourne's central business district $80 million a year in lost productivity, according to economic modelling and research by Monash University.

Petrol prices, population growth and environmental concerns have been cited as the key reasons for the surge in patronage in the documents, which detail the 2009 funding proposal for the $5 billion Footscray-Caulfield rail tunnel. The tunnel project - designed to improve cross-town train travel - gained federal planning funding, but has been all but abandoned by the state government.

Future Melbourne Committee chairman, Cr Kevin Louey, last week called for the tunnel to go ahead, warning that if Melbourne's overcrowding problem was not addressed, the city's prosperity would suffer.

Transport Minister Terry Mulder said the Coalition was committed to tackling the problem by funding the Regional Rail Link - which will free up more space in the metropolitan timetable for city train services - despite a $1 billion cost blowout inherited from the previous Labor government.

He said the government was also buying 45 six-carriage trains a year, seven more than the previous Labor government, to help alleviate overcrowding. ''We are driving ourselves out of congestion,'' Mr Mulder said.

The documents obtained by The Sunday Age show that the next decade will see a surge in the use of all modes of public transport: not only will train patronage rise at all times of the day and on weekends, bus travel is expected to double and tram use is predicted to rise by one third.

Mr Mulder said more recent estimates suggested train patronage would grow by about 4.5 per cent a year, slightly less than predicted in 2009.

But rough calculations on current patronage figures would still put the increase at more than a million trips a day by 2021.

Watergardens and Werribee lines are expected to grow the most, by about 6.8 per cent a year, because of population growth. The Alamein, Glen Waverley, Lilydale and Belgrave lines will experience the least growth, at only 2.5 per cent a year.

The predicted rise in train use will exacerbate the overcrowding crisis and ramp up the already substantial cost to the CBD in lost productivity, according to the Monash University research.

If overcrowding on trains continues, it will drive business out of the CBD because more people will look for work in the suburbs so they don't have to negotiate the public transport crush, the research warns.

Monash University's professor of public transport Graham Currie said getting workers to retail and business districts efficiently was critical to a city's operation and the Coalition's plan for an extra 45 trains a year would not alleviate the problem of overcrowding.

''Cities are very efficient places to do business because the railway is there. If the railway does not work effectively there is an economic cost,'' he said.

''Workers get very frustrated on public transport: it is late; they cannot get a seat. Eventually, there is a portion of the workforce that will take a job outside the city, so their journey to work can be less stressful.''

Victorian Employers Chamber of Commerce and Industry spokesman Chris James agreed overcrowded public transport caused reduced productivity and was affecting businesses.

''If it gets much worse it will make the CBD a much less attractive place to invest,'' Mr James said.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/city-bound-for-commuter-hell-20110618-1g97z.html

[ozbob]

Sent to all outlets:

19th June 2011

Sober reading for all

Greetings,

Article from the Melbourne Age, reality.  In south east Queensland a critical project such as Cross River Rail is put on the back burner.  Authorities are unable apparently to fix a simple timetable issue.  What hope is there for the longer term?  Crikey ...

Best wishes
Robert

Robert Dow
Administration
admin@backontrack.org

========================================

From the Melbourne Age click here!

City bound for commuter hell
Deborah Gough
June 19, 2011

WITHIN a decade, Melbourne's already bursting train services will have to accommodate an extra 1 million passenger trips a day.

The forecast, contained in Transport Department documents obtained by The Sunday Age under freedom of information, reveals that average weekday travel on trains will rise from about 800,000 trips to 1.8 million by 2021-22.

This will put unprecedented pressure on the city's beleaguered rail network, which is already costing Melbourne's central business district $80 million a year in lost productivity, according to economic modelling and research by Monash University.

Petrol prices, population growth and environmental concerns have been cited as the key reasons for the surge in patronage in the documents, which detail the 2009 funding proposal for the $5 billion Footscray-Caulfield rail tunnel. The tunnel project - designed to improve cross-town train travel - gained federal planning funding, but has been all but abandoned by the state government.

Future Melbourne Committee chairman, Cr Kevin Louey, last week called for the tunnel to go ahead, warning that if Melbourne's overcrowding problem was not addressed, the city's prosperity would suffer.

Transport Minister Terry Mulder said the Coalition was committed to tackling the problem by funding the Regional Rail Link - which will free up more space in the metropolitan timetable for city train services - despite a $1 billion cost blowout inherited from the previous Labor government.

He said the government was also buying 45 six-carriage trains a year, seven more than the previous Labor government, to help alleviate overcrowding. ''We are driving ourselves out of congestion,'' Mr Mulder said.

The documents obtained by The Sunday Age show that the next decade will see a surge in the use of all modes of public transport: not only will train patronage rise at all times of the day and on weekends, bus travel is expected to double and tram use is predicted to rise by one third.

Mr Mulder said more recent estimates suggested train patronage would grow by about 4.5 per cent a year, slightly less than predicted in 2009.

But rough calculations on current patronage figures would still put the increase at more than a million trips a day by 2021.

Watergardens and Werribee lines are expected to grow the most, by about 6.8 per cent a year, because of population growth. The Alamein, Glen Waverley, Lilydale and Belgrave lines will experience the least growth, at only 2.5 per cent a year.

The predicted rise in train use will exacerbate the overcrowding crisis and ramp up the already substantial cost to the CBD in lost productivity, according to the Monash University research.

If overcrowding on trains continues, it will drive business out of the CBD because more people will look for work in the suburbs so they don't have to negotiate the public transport crush, the research warns.

Monash University's professor of public transport Graham Currie said getting workers to retail and business districts efficiently was critical to a city's operation and the Coalition's plan for an extra 45 trains a year would not alleviate the problem of overcrowding.

''Cities are very efficient places to do business because the railway is there. If the railway does not work effectively there is an economic cost,'' he said.

''Workers get very frustrated on public transport: it is late; they cannot get a seat. Eventually, there is a portion of the workforce that will take a job outside the city, so their journey to work can be less stressful.''

Victorian Employers Chamber of Commerce and Industry spokesman Chris James agreed overcrowded public transport caused reduced productivity and was affecting businesses.

''If it gets much worse it will make the CBD a much less attractive place to invest,'' Mr James said.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/city-bound-for-commuter-hell-20110618-1g97z.html

[colinw]

Melbourne's rail patronage (800,000 trips a day) is staggering compared to Brisbane's, particularly considering its fleet of electric trains is only about 50% larger than ours (CityTrain: 207 x 3 car sets, plus 8 ICE cars vs Metro: 321 x 3 car sets + 6 x 6 car Hitchi + some hired DMUs for Stony Point).  Clearly Melbourne manages to get a much utilisation of its fleet - something like four times the patronage on only 1.5 times the trains.

Is there in data available to say what the per km subsidy in Melbourne is compared to Brisbane?

The reality is that if a similar surge in patronage were to occur here, neither the rail or bus system would be able to cope.

[O_128]

Melbourne's rail patronage (800,000 trips a day) is staggering compared to Brisbane's, particularly considering its fleet of electric trains is only about 50% larger than ours (CityTrain: 207 x 3 car sets, plus 8 ICE cars vs Metro: 321 x 3 car sets + 6 x 6 car Hitchi + some hired DMUs for Stony Point).  Clearly Melbourne manages to get a much utilisation of its fleet - something like four times the patronage on only 1.5 times the trains.

Is there in data available to say what the per km subsidy in Melbourne is compared to Brisbane?

The reality is that if a similar surge in patronage were to occur here, neither the rail or bus system would be able to cope.

Obviously metro doesnt see the benefits of positioning its fleet 8 hours before the afternoon peak 

[ozbob]

Melbourne's rail patronage (800,000 trips a day) is staggering compared to Brisbane's, particularly considering its fleet of electric trains is only about 50% larger than ours (CityTrain: 207 x 3 car sets, plus 8 ICE cars vs Metro: 321 x 3 car sets + 6 x 6 car Hitchi + some hired DMUs for Stony Point).  Clearly Melbourne manages to get a much utilisation of its fleet - something like four times the patronage on only 1.5 times the trains.

Is there in data available to say what the per km subsidy in Melbourne is compared to Brisbane?

The reality is that if a similar surge in patronage were to occur here, neither the rail or bus system would be able to cope.

There is a better utilisation of the fleet outside the core peaks, this in turn leads to higher more manageable loadings.  In south east Queensland we have a 'split personality' railway.  A peak railway and an off peak railway.  They are different things.  The present timetables and fare structure just reinforces the split personality, do you think ECT might help? LOL

One way of handling the surge, which according to Queensland Government documents is coming, is to turn the split personality into one personality ...

[SurfRail]

Melbourne, Sydney and Perth also have the massive advantage of having rail access where people actually need to go on a much larger scale than in Brisbane.  Of our major metropolitan centres, only one (Indooroopilly) has walk-up rail access.  Brisbane is much closer to Adelaide in that respect, although even they are starting to get their feeder buses working for them.

If you inserted the figures for the busways, we would certainly compare more favorably in patronage terms, but not on subsidies or fleet utilisation...

[O_128]

Effectively our bus system would be comparable while our rail system is comparable to those cities bus systems 

[colinw]

Melbourne, Sydney and Perth also have the massive advantage of having rail access where people actually need to go on a much larger scale than in Brisbane. 

Yes, that's true.  Brisbane's development pattern and secondary activity centres seem to be located along the former TRAM network - our city is laid out around infrastructure that no longer exists.

[somebody]

Melbourne's rail patronage (800,000 trips a day) is staggering compared to Brisbane's, particularly considering its fleet of electric trains is only about 50% larger than ours (CityTrain: 207 x 3 car sets, plus 8 ICE cars vs Metro: 321 x 3 car sets + 6 x 6 car Hitchi + some hired DMUs for Stony Point).  Clearly Melbourne manages to get a much utilisation of its fleet - something like four times the patronage on only 1.5 times the trains.

Is there in data available to say what the per km subsidy in Melbourne is compared to Brisbane?

The reality is that if a similar surge in patronage were to occur here, neither the rail or bus system would be able to cope.

This is unsurprising.  Provide a reasonable off peak service, and you get much better utilisation of the rail system.

The difference is a bit less when you consider that the V/Line services to Geelong/Bendigo/Ballarat/Seymour/Traralgon not considered part of Metro but would be part of QR.  Counting only EMUs & SMUs you would get 87+88=175 (1 unit scrapped AIUI).  And I though there were 7 Hitachis?  I assume there are 800k trips per weekday.  SEQ has maybe 240k trips per weekday (60m/250weekdays/year), but almost certainly, significantly less than this.

Here's an interesting link regarding the PT subsidy.  Sydney is well out of the water.  I say largely due to the inefficiency of CityRail: http://www.cgc.gov.au/__data/assets/file/0013/17104/2009_-_Urban_Public_Transport_Review_-_exec_summary.pdf
I suppose the high take up of PT in Sydney in peak hour would also be a factor.

[ozbob]

Melbourne, Sydney and Perth also have the massive advantage of having rail access where people actually need to go on a much larger scale than in Brisbane. 

Yes, that's true.  Brisbane's development pattern and secondary activity centres seem to be located along the former TRAM network - our city is laid out around infrastructure that no longer exists.

That is only partly so, look at Caboolture to Ipswich corridor.  Massive residential and industrial all the way along the corridor, not used maximally because of pathetic train frequency overall ... and mediocre feeder services in the main.

[colinw]

That is true, particularly in the case of the Ipswich line.  However in the northern suburbs there is as much or more activity at Chermside & Stafford (both Tram suburbs).  On the south side the former Salisbury & Mt Gravatt tramlines traversed dense suburbia & commercial development, whereas the Beenleigh line goes through an industrial wasteland around Rocklea.

Brisbane's suburban rail system happened somewhat by accident, being suburban operations that grew on the two main lines and the inner sections of a network of country branch lines. The only Brisbane line that was explicitly built as a suburban passenger carrying railway was the Shorncliffe line, and its short branch to the racecourse at Eagle Farm.  The other branches like Ferny Grove are suburban segments of country branch lines, much like the Epping Line in Melbourne is the surviving suburban segment of a country branch to Whittlesea.