Time To Pension OFF XPT's

[SteelPan]

With the Qld Govt having a new "state-of-the-art" - or, as the recently booted out state govt up here use to say - to the point you needed a comfort bag - WORLD CLASS Sunlander unit under construction , with all the continued talk of "high speed" rail in Australia, with Vic's Vlocity units fully operational some years and, above all that, with the calendar simply now showing the Year "2012" - isn't it time Countrylink, in partnership with the Fed's, developed/selected/built a new WORLD CLASS long-distance train - a train that could operate, initally, on current corridors and POTENTIALLY at some stage in the future, on new corridors that would permit higher-speeds.

So, I put it to you - it's time to Pension OFF the OLD XPT's!  (seriously, I was kid in primary skool when they came on-stream, I'm now the wrong side of [cough cough] 40)  

Thr XPT's have to go....  

[colinw]

Some kind of diesel tilt would do the job for Brisbane - Sydney.

Melbourne - Sydney is way overdue for double line and 25KV AC electrification throughout.

[Gazza]

I wouldn't care one bit if the XPT was privatised. It's a crap train, like most intercity rail in Australia.

[SteelPan]

I wouldn't care one bit if the XPT was privatised. It's a cr%p train, like most intercity rail in Australia.

I would suggest NOT privatising long-distance trains in Australia.  Thinly spread population, over large distances, does not make for a good business plan for any private operator, certainly not one who'd provide a genuine service - remember alot of these trains are not "tourist" types, operated by the likes of GSR, they are public service railways.

They were once great, ie, Southern Auroa, Spirit of Progress and others - the politicans and govt boffins showed complete distain for rail when they took those trains, their names, their history away and gave the people cheap plastic in their place - tell me, did your taxes go down a dollar?

We cannot go back, but we can built affordable, quality long-distance train units geared to Australia - the XPT never was.  The best way perhaps to do this, Federalise most/all long-distance trains in Australia, standardise operations, management, booking systems, pricing, inventory, mainteance, supplies etc - an Australian "Amtrack" -maybe that's another topic - but the XPT's need replacement!

[Gazza]

The way I see it, the full Syd-Bne run (or Syd-Mel) on the current train will only ever be a welfare service, its just too slow, and no amount of flashiness in the train will make up for that. Plane or coach would be faster.
I've sort of got the mindset that until its full HSR, the current rail service is useless.

In the interim, I reckon run our intercity lines more like V/Line (Rather than something you catch all the way from Captial to Capital)....So a little 2 Car Velo type thing, reasonably zippy (Velos are as fast as a tilt), the one train does the full run from BNE to SYD, with driver swaps along the way, at say 2h frequency, and design it such that it is more for going to the next town up or down the coast.
Same logic could be applied to services north of Brisbane. A few trains per day, good for getting from say Bundaberg to Gladstone or whatever.

[colinw]

For travel from Sydney to Brisbane, anything short of a 350km/h VHT will be a waste of time

For shorter journeys (e.g. Grafton to Brisbane), an upgraded rail service is the only way to go. Same as for the NCL to Cairns.

Sydney to Brisbane covers some very desirable tourist destinations as well.

[SurfRail]

The XPT is definitely overdue for replacement.

The real trouble is the track alignment and the priority given to passenger trains.  You can buy all the Pendolinos you want, but you will struggle to get much better outcomes than present with the existing speeds and having to duck into a siding to let freights past. 

The issue is a lot more structural than simply replacing the rolling stock, although that would be a reasonable start.

[HappyTrainGuy]

Leave the XPTs alone. The type of track and its condition also plays a part in its speed. NSW has quite a few speed restrictions due to its track infrastructure age

[SteelPan]

Longer distance trains along the east coast don't really serve Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne - if you're travelling between the cities 99% of people would indeed fly.  It's the smaller communities between the major cities that look to the train - those people pay taxes too and we as an nation ignore our regional communities to our detriment.

Obviously, major new high-speed capable corridors are not going to appear in the short-term and trains travelling even at say 250kmph are not much point when stopping at multiple smaller stations - something like the QR diesel tilt may well be the answer, as mentioned above, but capable of say around 150kmph, over the entire trip.  Genuine high-speed rail in Australia, ie, 300kmph, is at least 20yrs off - at least!

AGREE - the XPT's should be left alone, in the train museum where they now belong!   

[Stillwater]

Associated 'value capture' from NSW rail corridors

http://www.parliament.nsw.gov.au/prod/parlment/committee.nsf/0/ed36f0e66e6a1272ca2579ce0002487a/$FILE/sub.51.pdf

Franchising passenger rail in NSW

http://www.infrastructure.org.au/Content/NSWRailReform.aspx

Very Fast Train for eastern seaboard

http://www.infrastructure.org.au/Content/veryfasttrains.aspx

[Jonno]

Maybe this thread should have been titled Time to Upgrade the XPT!

[ozbob]

Maybe this thread should have been titled Time to Upgrade the XPT!

+1

[HappyTrainGuy]

AGREE - the XPT's should be left alone, in the train museum where they now belong!  

What's your deal with the XPTs needing to be replaced. Yes, some were built in the early 80's but a lot of the fleet were built by ABB/ADtranz? from a second tender a decade later in the early/mid 90's. All our EMUs were built in the late 70's and early 80's yet their still running strong and are still perferred over the more modern trains in certain scenarios. The XPTs aren't any grouches too when it comes to speed getting clocked just over 180kph during initial testing then at 193kph during later testing. 5 years later the ETT beat it running 210kph. The Sunlander had its own other world of issues regarding its replacment rather than just a new updated train for those in 2012. Issues include its phisical age, spare parts, rated lifespan of parts for regular full time passenger services, DDA requirments, known noise/vibration problems with wheel flats both internally and externally, external contracts and available space at Mayne for its length, stowing, shunting and maintainence cycles.

If anything all they need is a good refurb. They still have plenty of life in them.

[somebody]

The way I see it, the full Syd-Bne run (or Syd-Mel) on the current train will only ever be a welfare service, its just too slow, and no amount of flashiness in the train will make up for that. Plane or coach would be faster.
I've sort of got the mindset that until its full HSR, the current rail service is useless.

+1

The real trouble is the track alignment and the priority given to passenger trains.  You can buy all the Pendolinos you want, but you will struggle to get much better outcomes than present with the existing speeds and having to duck into a siding to let freights past. 

They already have priority.

I think it is indefensible.  Why should rail freight be sidelined for a train that is mostly a sop to a few pensioners who don't care that much about speed anyway?

[SurfRail]

They already have priority.

I think it is indefensible.  Why should rail freight be sidelined for a train that is mostly a sop to a few pensioners who don't care that much about speed anyway?

Delays to bulk freight aren't as significant, especially when passengers may need to make connections to or at remote places. 

The only freight chain where that sort of imperative exists is the Hunter and Central Qld coal networks where there is a massive backlog of shipping.

[somebody]

They already have priority.

I think it is indefensible.  Why should rail freight be sidelined for a train that is mostly a sop to a few pensioners who don't care that much about speed anyway?

Delays to bulk freight aren't as significant, especially when passengers may need to make connections to or at remote places. 

The only freight chain where that sort of imperative exists is the Hunter and Central Qld coal networks where there is a massive backlog of shipping.

I don't know, isn't reliability a factor in choosing road transport vs rail?

I'm more thinking about containers.  Let's assume bulk = grain, cement etc where there is still competition between road and rail.  Putting the freighter away into a loop at all, let alone for hours (to save a couple of minutes for the XPT) has to increase the cost of the rail freight and therefore reduce its market share.

I agree that it is less significant for commodities, but don't we wont rail freight to rise above a commodity only market?

[Otto]

Bring back the old Brisbane Limited !! Fond memories of that service..

[skippy]

Happy to keep the XPT - just reschedule the Roma St departure times to avoid the commuter peak. Tens of millions were spent to provide a third track at Salisbury, however due to the XPT timetable we can not use the thing for inbound trains between 7.40am and 8.00am - when it's most needed.

[ghostryder]

All
I live in an area where the Xpt services, there are three Services NT31/32 NT33/34 NT35/36. These services run over the course of the day, now to some they maybe a pain to others they need to be in a museum, but to those of us that use them they are in some ways the only way to link between several towns, there are two bus companies that i am aware of that offer services Between Brisbane and Sydney these being Greyhound and Premier Motor Coaches. There are also several towns that have airports they either have a link to Brisbane or to Sydney very few if any have a direct link to the next airport if that airport is not Sydney. I know of one Bus company that runs a bus service to a neighbouring town but the services are at best the same number of services offered by the Xpt.

In regards to transit times the buses according to the timetables are as slow if not slower than the Xpt service pending what company you ride with. The other thing not all of these services are daytime and not all companies offer a daytime run. Putting a freighter away cost us more than most people think. There have been several people that have paid a heavy price for the delays to the freighters on the rails, See Sydney is the only city in the country that has a freight curfew, this curfew operated Monday to Friday excluding public holidays. the morning curfew is 6am to 9am and the afternoon one is 3pm to 7pm. So if the freighter misses the window to get into Sydney it has to be held somewhere till the curfew is over then once it is clear it gets into Sydney then it still has to shunt and this can be several hours and if the trains off its path it then is at the mercy of the controllers and operators. And if one or all Xpts are late and sometimes that could be smokers taking their time to get back on the train have seen it often the poor freighter cops it, and if the freighter is effected it has a knock on effect with freight handlers sometimes deciding rails to slow and put things on to the roads and then we the car user face the increase of trucks and they are pressured to be at their destination as fast as possible and some cut corners to make it happen. How many families have had heartache trough this so we all suffer if the freights get messed up badly too.

Tabling the Xpt to leave later out of Brisbane will have a knock on effect, the trains due into Sydney after 9pm at night already so for every hour back you put it the later the train arrives in Sydney, Also to be considered would be the down times and servicing of the sets. It could also require the re writing of the other services as well as the downtime and servicing periods.

scott

[Fares_Fair]

Happy to retain XPT.

NCL has freight curfews.

Inner City Rail Capacity Study - Stage 3 Freight Analysis
produced for Queensland Transport by SYSTEMWIDE, states in Chapter 9, p25;

Conclusion  p25,

   "From an inner city perspective, the best course of action for the future of freight is
   to increase the North coast intermodal train consist lengths to 1500m. Doing so will
   alleviate the need to upgrade the inner city, and will allow the current (desired)
   freight distribution to be maintained with operational viability. If 1500m trains
   cannot be accommodated, the freight services should be spread apart ..."

   "The freight curfew should remain, as running freight services during the peak hour
   can only be achieved by extensive additional infrastructure, or by removing
   passenger services causing unacceptable overloading."

[Gazza]

Cant the XPT leave really early instead then? Eg 5am?

[SurfRail]

Tabling the Xpt to leave later out of Brisbane will have a knock on effect, the trains due into Sydney after 9pm at night already so for every hour back you put it the later the train arrives in Sydney, Also to be considered would be the down times and servicing of the sets. It could also require the re writing of the other services as well as the downtime and servicing periods.

Which is a problem for the NSW state government to work out (including their absence of a potential replacement or capacity enhancement for the rollingstock). 

We need to be advocates for SEQ commuters first and foremost, and frankly the loadings on the XPT are nowhere near as significant to SEQ's transport network as the Gold Coast and Beenleigh trains which the XPT stops from running in the morning.  It needs to arrive and depart at a non-peak time for Brisbane and Sydney, and currently it does not do that.

[ghostryder]

Gazza
Finding the right time will be the problem as i have heard others whinge it arrives and leaves to early now.

Surfrail
Its not just a NSW issue its a Queensland issue as well seeing as the Queensland Government have involvement which iirc includes some cost sharing for its operation. Not sure but maybe there is an arrangement in place that predates the line being converted to dual gauge as it was originally SG before the third rail was added.

Scott

[HappyTrainGuy]

Qld mostly funds the track maintainence/track fees/stabling etc during the queensland section, station staff at Roma Street, cleaning... usually the collecting and disposing of rubbish from CountryLink staff and other small duties. From my understanding outside of that the rest is pretty much up to NSW to fund.

[ghostryder]

thanks for that Happy Train guy i knew there was input but was not sure at what extent it covered.

scott

[Gazza]

Gazza
Finding the right time will be the problem as i have heard others whinge it arrives and leaves to early now.

Who cares though? So few people use it anyway.

[SurfRail]

Surfrail
Its not just a NSW issue its a Queensland issue as well seeing as the Queensland Government have involvement which iirc includes some cost sharing for its operation. Not sure but maybe there is an arrangement in place that predates the line being converted to dual gauge as it was originally SG before the third rail was added.

No doubt Scott, but the broader issues of what needs to be done do to accommodate a changed departure time are really an issue for ARTC/RailCorp/CountryLink and TfNSW, as are the more basic issues of how they are going to replace the fleet in future.  We just have to push them to actually do something about it so we can run more metropolitan trains up here in the morning, and so it doesn't put them out when trains enter RailCorp territory (particularly once they hit suburban Sydney). 

There are people on here who would seriously suggest getting rid of it (I'm not one of them), but few people would think the current scheduling is the best deal we could get for our co-funding.

[Golliwog]

How much would it cost to make a second dual gauge track from South Bank through to where the XPT/freights pulls off the GC/Beenleigh line? If you could run the XPT in with other south bound Cleveland/Beenleigh services you wouldn't have the issue with it blocking the 3rd track. Surely 1 potential conflicting move further south is better than taking up the whole 3rd track in the wrong direction. Plus it'd give you more options for freight coming from the POB if you hooked it at least to Buranda as well.

[HappyTrainGuy]

How much would it cost to make a second dual gauge track from South Bank through to where the XPT/freights pulls off the GC/Beenleigh line? If you could run the XPT in with other south bound Cleveland/Beenleigh services you wouldn't have the issue with it blocking the 3rd track. Surely 1 potential conflicting move further south is better than taking up the whole 3rd track in the wrong direction. Plus it'd give you more options for freight coming from the POB if you hooked it at least to Buranda as well.

Not even worth it. There would be issues around the safety margins between other trains and trackside infrastructure as the right hand side of the rollinstock overhangs too far on the narrow gauge setup. Just modify the departure times. The whole XPT needs a timetable rewrite. I'd even go as far as saying just postpone it by ~12 hours so its a late arvo/night departure from Brisbane and a early arrival in Sydney.

[ghostryder]

Surfrail
I am open to correction on this but the information i have has two rail controllers. Between the NSW/Queensland Border to Brisbane there are two controllers that cover the rails these being ARTC and QR. The ARTC and QR boundary is from what i have been told near the southern entrance to Acacia Ridge Yard which is about give or take 15kms from Brisbane or 971kms from Sydney. Below is an extract from  a timetable for a forth coming trip to Brisbane by a heritage service.

pass Kyogle Loop 0815, arrive Loadstone 0853, x, depart 0910, pass Glenapp 0944, Tamrookum 1017, Bromelton 1026, Greenbank 1049, Acacia Ridge 1106, thence as tabled by QR Rail.

Now my understanding again open for correction is that the operator in the case of the thread is Countrylink supplies a draft timetable for the service it intends to run to Railcorp/Cityrail, ARTC and QR operations/controls for the running of the Brisbane Xpt. And then these three organizations plot a path and work out any and all crosses with other tabled services and once all issues are sorted the timetables approved by all three. So in a way QR have more of a hand in the Xpt's operation north of the Border. Time will tell if the Xpt is replaced and if so with what. I guess that bridge gets crossed at the right moment. The service the Xpt replaced the old Brisbane Limited many of its carriages ranged in age from 10-40 odd years old. So who knows what or if anything will happen.

scott

[SurfRail]

Timetabling, agree it looks ugly, but QR agree to it so assume they don't share same issues as posters here or RP and other forums.

Don't be so sure.  The timetable is not ideal, and QR/TransLink are painfully aware of that now there is a need for more Beenleigh and Gold Coast trains.

Of course NSW has their hands tied because the fleet is over stretched..

They need to deliver a Grafton XPT, Casino XPT and a Brisbane XPT each day.  They don't necessarily have to maintain the current placement of each of those services.  Little reason for instance why the existing Grafton XPT could not be converted to the Brisbane service and be made to leave Sydney a few hours earlier, so it can depart and arrive both Sydney and Brisbane outside each city's peak.

[ghostryder]

Surfrail
Yeah i can think one, that the set used on the Grafton Xpt is the same set that arrives in Sydney from Melbourne on the overnight service and the set needs to have the toilets decanted the train configured for daytime running by removing those things needed for night ops then all the seats need to be turned to face point of travel not to mention the power cars need to be refueled, and pending arrival times there is NT34 arriving at the same time from Casino so i am guessing first in first served. Both of these services are due in around 7am to 8am. Also should the need to be there they use the time to shunt in or out defective cars or additional cars pending loadings and or bookings.

Scott

[SurfRail]

Surfrail
Yeah i can think one, that the set used on the Grafton Xpt is the same set that arrives in Sydney from Melbourne on the overnight service and the set needs to have the toilets decanted the train configured for daytime running by removing those things needed for night ops then all the seats need to be turned to face point of travel not to mention the power cars need to be refueled, and pending arrival times there is NT34 arriving at the same time from Casino so i am guessing first in first served. Both of these services are due in around 7am to 8am. Also should the need to be there they use the time to shunt in or out defective cars or additional cars pending loadings and or bookings.

Scott

That's an operational issue for them to fix.  If they need to reschedule the Melbourne and Dubbo XPT as well to fit the maintenance and in-service rotation, then it needs to be done.  It just cannot be that much of an issue.

CountryLink can't just keep taking up valuable peak hour track slots on our own network for something that has nowhere near the benefit to our system.  Full XPT = nowhere near even a fully-seated IMU - plus the XPT is generally not going to be full, and the IMU will usually have standing passengers.  It's no contest.  (Melbourne suffers nowhere near the impact either no matter when trains show up due to the Jacana standard gauge line, whereas our network loses an express track for a much much greater distance.)

[ghostryder]

Surfrail
One could apply the same logic, lack of extra tracks is an operational issue that QR needs to fix not Countrylink, Countrylink just run a service when they are pathed or timetabled too, they don't control the tracks. 

scott

[HappyTrainGuy]

The majority of the timetable was also made when QR had less rollingstock available at a time where there was the capacity for the XPT to be run. Quite a few years later its just not the same case.

[SurfRail]

Surfrail
One could apply the same logic, lack of extra tracks is an operational issue that QR needs to fix not Countrylink, Countrylink just run a service when they are pathed or timetabled too, they don't control the tracks. 

scott

Um, yes.  Which is why the timetable needs to be changed.  Doesn't really matter who drives it, we are only interested in the outcome.

If CountryLink need to reorganise other services to match, then they have to do it.  I know for a fact this is on the cards for the next round of improvements for Sector II, so they will have to deal with it eventually.

[SurfRail]

They could always look at cascading the Endeavours into service as well with some suitable modifications, by buying a few more Hunter sets or electrifying further south from Kiama, further south from Macarthur and from Newcastle to Maitland/Telarah.  (There is little risk of 25kV AC mainline electrification in NSW absent something like a VFT, so may as well look at getting the DC sparks out a little bit further for limited cost.)

I'm happy to accept the problem is complex and the XPTs are running at ridiculously high utilisation, but no problem is completely intractable.