How the SEQ rail network will operate after CRR is commissioned (2025).

[ozbob]

Yes breaking the GC connection for Airtrain is obviously an important issue for Airtrain as they have built a large part of their operating model on that > https://www.airtrain.com.au/catch-airtrain-to/gold-coast-and-surfers-paradise/

The network design as best can now be determined doesn't allow the trains coming out of the tunnel to ease over to the subs without conflicts and so forth and is not going to happen.

Having the northern mains trains running into the tunnel is certainly going to deliver more pax into the tunnel.  There is also the prospect of 9 car trains eventually running GC to Sunshine Coast eventually as well.

If it is as has been suggested, Airtrain contract is fundamentally between Roma St and Airport then the network as mapped will eventuate.

[JimmyP]

As far as I remember, it was always the case that the GC-Airport pairing would be broken with CRR, even since the original iteration?

[ozbob]

As far as I remember, it was always the case that the GC-Airport pairing would be broken with CRR, even since the original iteration?

Correct!

From Cross River Rail Reference Design Overview 2010 page 72

The introduction of Cross River Rail is based on
breaking the current network into sectors as
follows:
• North-south Cross River Rail sector -
connects the Beenleigh and Gold Coast to
Caboolture and Sunshine Coast lines and
allows the transition to nine car sets on
these high growth lines.
• East-west sector - connects the Springfield
and Rosewood/Ipswich to Airport and
Shorncliffe lines, which have similar rolling
stock type and off peak service numbers.
• Brisbane suburban sector - connects the
Ferny Grove and Doomben to Kuraby and
Cleveland/Manly lines, which service the
current Southbank and South Brisbane
stations and utilises the Ferny Grove
flyover and the suburban platforms in the
inner city.

[ozbob]

^ FMD that is eleven years ago ... 

[ozbob]

If you want a copy of the Cross River Rail Reference Design Overview October 2010

Click here --> https://backontrack.org/docs/crr/pdf_cross_river_rail_reference_design_overview.pdf PDF 9 MB

[ozbob]

https://twitter.com/railbotforum/status/1387425269661659140

[ozbob]

https://twitter.com/ozbob13/status/1387427926698643459

[ozbob]

As a bit of a thought exercise what additional inner system services will be needed, and perhaps other changes eg.  Gold Coast trains take over Beenleigh <> Loganlea.  The present Beenleigh services then finish and commence at Loganlea.

For example we have Northgate <> Park Road services for Inner City at present.

It has been suggested to me that for CRR there might be additional Mayne (Exhibition)<> (Yeerongpilly) Clapham services to cover gaps in the timetable for freight paths on northern mains (out of peak).

If 15 minute off peak could be achieved Springfield Central <> Shorncliffe then Ipswich line could revert to express running off peak as well as peak as it does now.

What do you think?

[achiruel]

A consistent, all-day 4 tph Shorncliffe <-> Springfield Central service will be difficult to achieve reliably, because of the single track between Sandgate and Shorncliffe. The moment someone sneezes, the whole thing falls to pieces.

Why they don't just duplicate it is beyond me. Surely it can't cost that much, and the benefits would be large. They could even close the section for a few months and run a StationLink bus, like is currently happening for Yeronga. 1 bus should be able to do 4 runs/hour pretty easily.

In the mean time, I guess you could do 2 tph Springfield Central<->Shorncliffe and 2 tph Springfield Central<->Northgate.

Not sure Ipswich<->Darra could handle 4 tph full-time either, as freight needs to fit in somewhere. Maybe if there was a third track from Darra to Ipswich.

[ozbob]

Ipswich <> Darra off peak interval is 30 minutes.  If 15 minute could be achieved Springfield Central <> Shorncliffe (or combination), it would allow the Ipswich line to go 24/7 express pattern (similar to Pakenham/Cranbourne services Caulfield <> Richmond, Frankston line covers the all station requirements).

Apart from freight on Ipswich west of Darra there are lot of non revenue train movements e.g. NGRs, as well.

[Gazza]

But the Gold Coast has its own airport, and the flights there are cheaper.
If tourist wants to go to the Gold Coast they'll fly there, it makes no sense to pay extra to fly into BNE and then pay for airtrain and then take an extra 2 hours.

And finally? Why so much focus on tourists. The network should focus on demand and capacity for the greatest number of users, not occasional tourists.

There's nothing wrong with changing trains.

Tourists to Sydney manage to change for trains to Bondi Junction.

Can anyone with the know how give information on the number of users touching on south of Beenleigh and touching off at the Airport Stations pre covid.

[BrizCommuter]

Great map. I would expect that the Beenleigh Line will terminate at Loganlea, and there may be two layers of Gold Coast peak services, but who knows in this secret state. EMUs will probably still be running on the Ferny Grove Heritage Railway Line. And what's wrong with Airtrain to Ipswich?

[ozbob]

Great map. I would expect that the Beenleigh Line will terminate at Loganlea, and there may be two layers of Gold Coast peak services, but who knows in this secret state. EMUs will probably still be running on the Ferny Grove Heritage Railway Line. And what's wrong with Airtrain to Ipswich?

Yes, no doubt what the major sectors will be.  Can you please expand on how two layers of Gold Coast peak services could operate please.
Just interested thanks.

Ha, I too expect the FG line could be a heritage tourist destination to ride the venerable EMUs!   

[Gazza]

And what's wrong with Airtrain to Ipswich?

Who knows, apparently we should be structuring our service patterns around the international tourist who wants to go straight from their redeye flight to the GC 

Time for some hard numbers in this discussion:

The reality is the whole branch only gets around 340,000 boardings per year, so less than 1000 per day.
International station gets only 92,000 per year, so about 250 per day 

Now, we know that a certain portion of Airtrain passengers will only go as far as the CBD stations, and we know others will be going to other areas of Brisbane. It really is only small numbers impacted by a change of trains to the gold coast.

[ozbob]

I wonder if it is worthwhile to make all Doomben services Park Road <> Doomben?  Some already are of course.

[timh]

I wonder if it is worthwhile to make all Doomben services Park Road <> Doomben?  Some already are of course.

I believe I brought this up earlier in the thread in relation to increasing frequency in South Bank / South Brisbane. I can't remember specifically but I feel like MTPCo said it didn't work for some reason.

[ozbob]

I wonder if it is worthwhile to make all Doomben services Park Road <> Doomben?  Some already are of course.

I believe I brought this up earlier in the thread in relation to increasing frequency in South Bank / South Brisbane. I can't remember specifically but I feel like MTPCo said it didn't work for some reason.

Not sure why it wouldn't.  Hopefully MTPCo can expand on this for us.

[kram0]

Why couldn't the Airport service go between Airport and Park Rd/Boggo Road? Easy change to the GC line.

[timh]

Why couldn't the Airport service go between Airport and Park Rd/Boggo Road? Easy change to the GC line.

You've got an even easier change to the GC line at Roma Street if you just leave it as is routed to Ipswich.

The purpose of running Doomben services via South Brisbane is to increase frequency on that corridor

Sent from my SM-G780F using Tapatalk

[Gazza]

Why couldn't the Airport service go between Airport and Park Rd/Boggo Road? Easy change to the GC line.

You've got an even easier change to the GC line at Roma Street if you just leave it as is routed to Ipswich.

The purpose of running Doomben services via South Brisbane is to increase frequency on that corridor

Sent from my SM-G780F using Tapatalk

I guess going to Southbank probably has advantages due to the hotels there, but it's not essential.

[Stillwater]

On-time running between Varsity Lakes and Gympie North (if through service operates full length) would be crucial. A cpl of small delays at one end could be magnified into a big delay at the other end.

[MTPCo]

I wonder if it is worthwhile to make all Doomben services Park Road <> Doomben?  Some already are of course.

I believe I brought this up earlier in the thread in relation to increasing frequency in South Bank / South Brisbane. I can't remember specifically but I feel like MTPCo said it didn't work for some reason.

Not sure why it wouldn't.  Hopefully MTPCo can expand on this for us.

Please forgive the slightly rushed nature of the answer, but hopefully it is sufficient.

The short answer is "they could, but...", because it would introduce a flat junction crossing where you otherwise don't have one, and would remove sectorisation of the network (which, given the design decisions they have made, seems to be a priority for whatever reason).

The attached slide shows the layout around Mayne as of Change 7 (I don't believe it has changed since then) and the normal (assumed) flows of trains. Running Doomben (or indeed Airport) from the northern subs into the city subs would create a flat junction crossing near the Ferny Grove flyover. Granted it wouldn't be the most onerous crossing of all time - perhaps 2tph crossing 12tph in the peak, and 2tph crossing 8tph off-peak - but in general you want to be moving away from flat junctions rather than introducing them, and you'd have to have a fairly strong desire to want to run those services to Park Road or the Cleveland line in order to make that movement (which there may be).

I realise this answer is probably not as clear cut as might be hoped, but it is the best I can do in the information vacuum we live in.

[timh]

On-time running between Varsity Lakes and Gympie North (if through service operates full length) would be crucial. A cpl of small delays at one end could be magnified into a big delay at the other end.

Much like the existing Gympie North service, I assume it will continue to terminate at Roma Street. Cab/Nambour/possible Beerwah terminators will most likely be the services that through-run to Varsity Lakes.

Actually that raises an interesting point. It would be impossible to terminate a service at the underground Roma Street platforms, which means either
a) Gympie North service does through run (which would be a bad outcome for reliability and the rolling stock and crew would be absolutely wrong for a Gold Coast service)
b) Gympie North services somehow swap tracks to the city Mains and continue through central etc like they currently do (this does break sectorisation though).
C) Gympie North services travel via Exhibition and onto Roma Street via the surface tracks and terminate at Roma Street like the Traveltrain services do. You don't get to go to Central this way but eh, you can easily transfer to another service at Roma Street.
D) Gympie North services are run as a shuttle to Nambour only.

Sent from my SM-G780F using Tapatalk

[ozbob]

I wonder if it is worthwhile to make all Doomben services Park Road <> Doomben?  Some already are of course.

I believe I brought this up earlier in the thread in relation to increasing frequency in South Bank / South Brisbane. I can't remember specifically but I feel like MTPCo said it didn't work for some reason.

Not sure why it wouldn't.  Hopefully MTPCo can expand on this for us.

Please forgive the slightly rushed nature of the answer, but hopefully it is sufficient.

The short answer is "they could, but...", because it would introduce a flat junction crossing where you otherwise don't have one, and would remove sectorisation of the network (which, given the design decisions they have made, seems to be a priority for whatever reason).

The attached slide shows the layout around Mayne as of Change 7 (I don't believe it has changed since then) and the normal (assumed) flows of trains. Running Doomben (or indeed Airport) from the northern subs into the city subs would create a flat junction crossing near the Ferny Grove flyover. Granted it wouldn't be the most onerous crossing of all time - perhaps 2tph crossing 12tph in the peak, and 2tph crossing 8tph off-peak - but in general you want to be moving away from flat junctions rather than introducing them, and you'd have to have a fairly strong desire to want to run those services to Park Road or the Cleveland line in order to make that movement (which there may be).

I realise this answer is probably not as clear cut as might be hoped, but it is the best I can do in the information vacuum we live in.

Thanks MTPCo.  Got it. 

[ozbob]

On-time running between Varsity Lakes and Gympie North (if through service operates full length) would be crucial. A cpl of small delays at one end could be magnified into a big delay at the other end.

Much like the existing Gympie North service, I assume it will continue to terminate at Roma Street. Cab/Nambour/possible Beerwah terminators will most likely be the services that through-run to Varsity Lakes.

Actually that raises an interesting point. It would be impossible to terminate a service at the underground Roma Street platforms, which means either
a) Gympie North service does through run (which would be a bad outcome for reliability and the rolling stock and crew would be absolutely wrong for a Gold Coast service)
b) Gympie North services somehow swap tracks to the city Mains and continue through central etc like they currently do (this does break sectorisation though).
C) Gympie North services travel via Exhibition and onto Roma Street via the surface tracks and terminate at Roma Street like the Traveltrain services do. You don't get to go to Central this way but eh, you can easily transfer to another service at Roma Street.
D) Gympie North services are run as a shuttle to Nambour only.

Sent from my SM-G780F using Tapatalk

I am hoping they would be shuttles by then, in fact there is an outside chance they could be in place before 2025.

[Arnz]

Could possibly just terminate the Gympie North runs at Nambour as a shuttle service.

However the issue is ATP, at this stage the reported intention is installing ETCS1&2 compatible ATP on the NGRs, which would enable north of Nambour running on the NGRs without a 2nd driver.   

IMO: Using a NGR only on the Gympie North shuttles would be a waste of a unit when ATP could've just been installed at least on the IMU120s so the shuttles could operate as a 3-car unit (The IMU120s are basically the orphans of the fleet anyway, and they have 'almost' similar seating (the headrests) to the old ICEs).

Image Source: https://www.sgbuses.com/index.php?/category/rail-queensland-imu120

[Gazza]

GYN could either be a shuttle, or follow whatever routing traveltrain will do.

[kram0]

I wonder if it is worthwhile to make all Doomben services Park Road <> Doomben?  Some already are of course.

I believe I brought this up earlier in the thread in relation to increasing frequency in South Bank / South Brisbane. I can't remember specifically but I feel like MTPCo said it didn't work for some reason.

Not sure why it wouldn't.  Hopefully MTPCo can expand on this for us.

Please forgive the slightly rushed nature of the answer, but hopefully it is sufficient.

The short answer is "they could, but...", because it would introduce a flat junction crossing where you otherwise don't have one, and would remove sectorisation of the network (which, given the design decisions they have made, seems to be a priority for whatever reason).

The attached slide shows the layout around Mayne as of Change 7 (I don't believe it has changed since then) and the normal (assumed) flows of trains. Running Doomben (or indeed Airport) from the northern subs into the city subs would create a flat junction crossing near the Ferny Grove flyover. Granted it wouldn't be the most onerous crossing of all time - perhaps 2tph crossing 12tph in the peak, and 2tph crossing 8tph off-peak - but in general you want to be moving away from flat junctions rather than introducing them, and you'd have to have a fairly strong desire to want to run those services to Park Road or the Cleveland line in order to make that movement (which there may be).

I realise this answer is probably not as clear cut as might be hoped, but it is the best I can do in the information vacuum we live in.

Thanks for that info MTPCo.

I might not be connecting all the dots here (clearly I am not in transport planning), but couldn't the Doomben line use the suburban subs as they do now, for both inbound and outbound services to go between Doomben and Park Road with no flat junction conflicts, other than what they have now? The outbound Doomben service, crosses the inbound subs just North of Eagle Junction, with the other conflict on this service coming as the Park Road bound train has to cross to the inbound track somewhere between Southbank and Park Road?

   

[HappyTrainGuy]

Reliability is going to be rubbish if trains run from GC into the NCL.

If something happens trains across the whole SEQ region will be impacted.

Yes. But there are other upsides such as 9 car trains which AFAIK has already been planned despite cost cuttings for gold plating over the years (remember the original 2005 NCL Caboolture-Nambour duplication and realignment project was based on provisions for a 9 car consist despite pollies demanding a 7th carriage be added to all trains. Petrie also has provisions installed for future upgrades with P1 already being able to run 9 cars). NCL provisions have already been considered (with NWTC or without NWTC ie exp Petrie-Exhibition) and provisions have already been taken into account for the Beenleigh/Gold Coast line (as noted in the CRR project). Post CRR going to a 9 car config should be pretty quick and straight forward with simple bolt on extensions to most stations. It's also the only configuration that will allow for all day 9 car services without introducing city station terminators. Boosting the capacity of those then removes the need for additional peak services allowing more infill services where capacity is needed.

More than likely they will be Caboolture-Varsity Lakes services with every second one going to Nambour (similar to the current existing Ipswich-Caboolture/Nambour setup) extended to Beerwah/Landsborough full time with most likely a 3 car shuttle to Nambour) post duplication and eventually onto the Sunshine Coast if and whenever that goes ahead.

On-time running between Varsity Lakes and Gympie North (if through service operates full length) would be crucial. A cpl of small delays at one end could be magnified into a big delay at the other end.

Much like the existing Gympie North service, I assume it will continue to terminate at Roma Street. Cab/Nambour/possible Beerwah terminators will most likely be the services that through-run to Varsity Lakes.

Actually that raises an interesting point. It would be impossible to terminate a service at the underground Roma Street platforms, which means either
a) Gympie North service does through run (which would be a bad outcome for reliability and the rolling stock and crew would be absolutely wrong for a Gold Coast service)
b) Gympie North services somehow swap tracks to the city Mains and continue through central etc like they currently do (this does break sectorisation though).
C) Gympie North services travel via Exhibition and onto Roma Street via the surface tracks and terminate at Roma Street like the Traveltrain services do. You don't get to go to Central this way but eh, you can easily transfer to another service at Roma Street.
D) Gympie North services are run as a shuttle to Nambour only.

Sent from my SM-G780F using Tapatalk

Not as bad as you think. Crews aren't an issue. They don't do the full length. Take the current arvo Gympie run for example. The driver that drove the train out of Mayne isn't the same driver that departs at Bowen Hills. And the Bowen Hills driver isn't the same one that arrives at Nambour. And that's based on crewing rosters with drivers based at Caboolture/Nambour/Gympie driving the train before signing off at their respective bases.

You won't get Roma Street terminators. Currently services use P10 to terminate in the morning. They do this to prevent hold ups in the single line running through the city. P8 has a terminating service that is held to be cleared and waits for the Bowen Hills service to arrive on P9. Usually as a train is going into P9 theres a train rolling into P10 at the same time. As soon as the P9 train is clear the P8 train enters the Normanby loop. P9 departs for central, P8 ipswich service arrives, P10 departs to Normanby and the process repeats. If Bowen Hills services are delayed by a minute its not uncommon to see trains running side by side in the same direction back to Mayne due to the bidi.

Sectorisation means bugger all. Trains are swapped routinely between the subs and mains. For instance there are several Cannon Hill/Cleveland based trains that will run via platform 5 at Central in morning peak due to congestion on the subs. Pretty sure on weekends you still get Cleveland and Springfield services arriving and departing P1/P2 citybound at the same time negating the need to run as fast as you can over the overpass to swap trains. Depending on what cross overs are used its quite straight forward with minimal delay. Via Bowen Hills inbound should still be quite straight forward depending on what track arrangement is made Albion-Mayne Junction. There's been god knows how many versions of this over the years (I can't even recall what the current one is because I've heard plans for so many versions). Who knows they might rebuild the current sub bridge higher, raise the approaches and change the whole configuration of the area ie dead running/peak services etc. It's another junction but it does allow to swap trains around quite a lot easier between the different sectors. If anything you'd have trains terminating at Boggo road and then running back to Mayne via Tennyson which already happens. You could also run it to P10 to Bowen Hills and then dead run it somewhere. But I don't really see that happening either.

What I do see happening is one of 3 things. A shuttle Gympie-Nambour with a cross platform transfer (similar to Rosewood-Ipswich). Something via Central changing sectors south of Albion. Or a thru service via CRR.

Could Ferny Grove <> Cleveland be the domain of the NNGRs alongside the 160/260 rollingstock, whilst NGRs on all other lines (excluding any Rosewood services).

Would be interesting to see what AirTrain thinks, I do wonder if they were consulted on the 'service plans' as this could be a clusterf___ if they were in the dark like us.

Possibly. But it all depends on the final network layout and what trains will be available. Also means you can start reducing the increased staffing costs associated with the NGRs with the additional staff required at stations. Something myself and quite a lot of the public has liked recently considering they were cutting staffing hours across the network hand over fist before the NGRs came into revenue service (a lot of the stations that had staff reductions/removal now have staff again). Also meant station facilities are also open

Airtrain contract is Airport-Roma Street with a secondary contract in regards to its ticketing scheme within the QR network.

I am hoping they would be shuttles by then, in fact there is an outside chance they could be in place before 2025.

Could possibly just terminate the Gympie North runs at Nambour as a shuttle service.

However the issue is ATP, at this stage the reported intention is installing ETCS1&2 compatible ATP on the NGRs, which would enable north of Nambour running on the NGRs without a 2nd driver.   

IMO: Using a NGR only on the Gympie North shuttles would be a waste of a unit when ATP could've just been installed at least on the IMU120s so the shuttles could operate as a 3-car unit (The IMU120s are basically the orphans of the fleet anyway, and they have 'almost' similar seating (the headrests) to the old ICEs).

Image Source: https://www.sgbuses.com/index.php?/category/rail-queensland-imu120

There's been talks of a couple SMU260's getting some upgrades soon for signalling testing + future rollingstock investigation. Who knows they might get shoved onto another line post CRR.

[aldonius]

I might not be connecting all the dots here (clearly I am not in transport planning), but couldn't the Doomben line use the suburban subs as they do now, for both inbound and outbound services to go between Doomben and Park Road with no flat junction conflicts, other than what they have now? The outbound Doomben service, crosses the inbound subs just North of Eagle Junction, with the other conflict on this service coming as the Park Road bound train has to cross to the inbound track somewhere between Southbank and Park Road?

If the Airport and Shorncliffe lines are paired with Ipswich and Springfield, then they'll take the mains through the city. But they have to take the subs through Northgate-Albion and cross over more-or-less as they pass underneath the Ferny Grove flyover.

So even if Doomben sticks on the subs the whole way through it still conflicts.

[ozbob]

I am really enjoying this discussion thread.  Thanks for all the contributions! 

Despite the obstacles to transparency before us it really is an exciting time.

Hope you are enjoying it too lurkers  
Your feeble defences smashed! Take heed ...

"Tell the truth, or someone will tell it for you."
― Stephanie Klein

[ozbob]

https://twitter.com/ozbob13/status/1387841734218977284

[JimmyP]

Could possibly just terminate the Gympie North runs at Nambour as a shuttle service.

However the issue is ATP, at this stage the reported intention is installing ETCS1&2 compatible ATP on the NGRs, which would enable north of Nambour running on the NGRs without a 2nd driver.   

IMO: Using a NGR only on the Gympie North shuttles would be a waste of a unit when ATP could've just been installed at least on the IMU120s so the shuttles could operate as a 3-car unit (The IMU120s are basically the orphans of the fleet anyway, and they have 'almost' similar seating (the headrests) to the old ICEs).

Image Source: https://www.sgbuses.com/index.php?/category/rail-queensland-imu120

By what i've been told, all trains except EMU/ICE will be fitted with ETCS. NGR are just easier/quicker to do as they were designed/built ETCS ready.

[ozbob]

Great map. I would expect that the Beenleigh Line will terminate at Loganlea, and there may be two layers of Gold Coast peak services, but who knows in this secret state. EMUs will probably still be running on the Ferny Grove Heritage Railway Line. And what's wrong with Airtrain to Ipswich?

Yes, no doubt what the major sectors will be.  Can you please expand on how two layers of Gold Coast peak services could operate please.
Just interested thanks.

Ha, I too expect the FG line could be a heritage tourist destination to ride the venerable EMUs!   

I don't think Briz has seen this query yet.

Would it be possible to have a super express, eg.  Varsity Lakes, Robina, Helensvale, Beenleigh, Loganlea, then Boggo Road etc.

Limited express, all stations Varsity Lake to Loganlea, then express Altandi, Boggo Road etc.

All stations ex Loganlea.

[ozbob]

Could possibly just terminate the Gympie North runs at Nambour as a shuttle service.

However the issue is ATP, at this stage the reported intention is installing ETCS1&2 compatible ATP on the NGRs, which would enable north of Nambour running on the NGRs without a 2nd driver.   

IMO: Using a NGR only on the Gympie North shuttles would be a waste of a unit when ATP could've just been installed at least on the IMU120s so the shuttles could operate as a 3-car unit (The IMU120s are basically the orphans of the fleet anyway, and they have 'almost' similar seating (the headrests) to the old ICEs).

Image Source: https://www.sgbuses.com/index.php?/category/rail-queensland-imu120

By what i've been told, all trains except EMU/ICE will be fitted with ETCS. NGR are just easier/quicker to do as they were designed/built ETCS ready.

I fairly confident we will see 3 car IMUs with ETCS doing Nambour - Gympie shuttles in a few years.

[HappyTrainGuy]

I might not be connecting all the dots here (clearly I am not in transport planning), but couldn't the Doomben line use the suburban subs as they do now, for both inbound and outbound services to go between Doomben and Park Road with no flat junction conflicts, other than what they have now? The outbound Doomben service, crosses the inbound subs just North of Eagle Junction, with the other conflict on this service coming as the Park Road bound train has to cross to the inbound track somewhere between Southbank and Park Road?

If the Airport and Shorncliffe lines are paired with Ipswich and Springfield, then they'll take the mains through the city. But they have to take the subs through Northgate-Albion and cross over more-or-less as they pass underneath the Ferny Grove flyover.

So even if Doomben sticks on the subs the whole way through it still conflicts.

At Albion the current mains will feed directly Into the CRR mains. Current subs will pair with the mains for access through the city. The current subs bridge over breakfast creek will be decommissioned. Another junction near the flyover will allow for access to the subs through the city. As far as I know there is no intention to replace the subs bridge as a cost saving measure.

[HappyTrainGuy]

Could possibly just terminate the Gympie North runs at Nambour as a shuttle service.

However the issue is ATP, at this stage the reported intention is installing ETCS1&2 compatible ATP on the NGRs, which would enable north of Nambour running on the NGRs without a 2nd driver.   

IMO: Using a NGR only on the Gympie North shuttles would be a waste of a unit when ATP could've just been installed at least on the IMU120s so the shuttles could operate as a 3-car unit (The IMU120s are basically the orphans of the fleet anyway, and they have 'almost' similar seating (the headrests) to the old ICEs).

Image Source: https://www.sgbuses.com/index.php?/category/rail-queensland-imu120

By what i've been told, all trains except EMU/ICE will be fitted with ETCS. NGR are just easier/quicker to do as they were designed/built ETCS ready.

I fairly confident we will see 3 car IMUs with ETCS doing Nambour - Gympie shuttles in a few years.

Only IMU160/SMU260 and possibly IMU100/120 - depending on when this is to be rolled out network wise. Too expensive to retrofit the remaining fleet due to cost. The SMU200s are already extremely costly with their ongoing electrical issues and should be going as soon as the next rollingstock contract is in full swing.

[Gazza]

Re the reliability of the SC line, IMO just terminate at Beerwah, and eventually extend to Caloundra.
Anything from Nambour could turn back at Clapham in peak.

[Arnz]

Re the reliability of the SC line, IMO just terminate at Beerwah, and eventually extend to Caloundra.
Anything from Nambour could turn back at Clapham in peak.

Won't work with only 2 platforms and no usable sidings at Beerwah. Knowing the state government they won't be willing to spend the money on a electrfied siding/temp wooden platform.

A 3rd Beerwah platform only comes with CAMCOS.

[achiruel]

^ any reason the 3rd platform at Beerwah couldn't be constructed prior to CAMCOS?