Double the trains to Ferny Grove

[somebody]

for all the slowing of the trains the ontime figures have hardly improved

Mirroring the NSW experience!

[beauyboy]

And guess what I said that to my otherhalf at the time that it would not work because NSW did it and did nothing and we all know the result.

Donald

[Golliwog]

The new .pdf files are up for the bus route timetable modifications (some have no changes to the bus times, just updating the connecting train times).

The new FG trains are also now online if you use the online timetable, but no .pdf timetable as yet. If they stick to a similar schedule as last time they changed the train times on the FG line, that should be available on the 9th or 10th of October...

[BrizCommuter]

Going by the journey planner it is as half-baked as we expected - goes from 15 min off-peak to 20 min gaps in peak, no extra late night train, no changes to the am peak gap of doom, no improvements to counter-peak. It's as if the politicians actually wrote the timetable.

[HappyTrainGuy]

Going by the journey planner it is as half-baked as we expected - goes from 15 min off-peak to 20 min gaps in peak, no extra late night train, no changes to the am peak gap of doom, no improvements to counter-peak. It's as if the politicians actually wrote the timetable.

And what did you honestly expect them to do? There were never going to be any peak hour service modifications. Counter peak is still during peak hour. Intra peak isn't during the night. They delivered 100% what they proposed and that was a 15 min intrapeak service.

[Gazza]

Going by the journey planner it is as half-baked as we expected - goes from 15 min off-peak to 20 min gaps in peak, no extra late night train, no changes to the am peak gap of doom, no improvements to counter-peak. It's as if the politicians actually wrote the timetable.

[Golliwog]

Going by the journey planner it is as half-baked as we expected - goes from 15 min off-peak to 20 min gaps in peak, no extra late night train, no changes to the am peak gap of doom, no improvements to counter-peak. It's as if the politicians actually wrote the timetable.

And what did you honestly expect them to do? There were never going to be any peak hour service modifications. Counter peak is still during peak hour. Intra peak isn't during the night. They delivered 100% what they proposed and that was a 15 min intrapeak service.

I actually think I would have preferred them to do it as part of the stage 2 timetable review, rather than delay that to implement the political promise. It's a load of BS when the media release announcing this improvement points out that peak hour has bigger gaps than off peak, and blames it on the previous government but does nothing to fix it and in fact made that sad point last longer by delaying the timetable review that would have fixed said abnormality to implement this pork barrel!

When it got to the stage that they've shifted what times past the hour the Shorncliffe trains leave Shorncliffe so they are different in the interpeak to the evening off peak (xx:12 and xx:42 during the day and xx:07 and xx:37 after 7pm), it went beyond focusing on implementing an election pork barrel, and into the territory of stuffing things up. Its only a small difference but what happened to having a consistent clock face timetable?

[BrizCommuter]

I actually think I would have preferred them to do it as part of the stage 2 timetable review, rather than delay that to implement the political promise. It's a load of BS when the media release announcing this improvement points out that peak hour has bigger gaps than off peak, and blames it on the previous government but does nothing to fix it and in fact made that sad point last longer by delaying the timetable review that would have fixed said abnormality to implement this pork barrel!

When it got to the stage that they've shifted what times past the hour the Shorncliffe trains leave Shorncliffe so they are different in the interpeak to the evening off peak (xx:12 and xx:42 during the day and xx:07 and xx:37 after 7pm), it went beyond focusing on implementing an election pork barrel, and into the territory of stuffing things up. Its only a small difference but what happened to having a consistent clock face timetable?

+1

Going by the journey planner it is as half-baked as we expected - goes from 15 min off-peak to 20 min gaps in peak, no extra late night train, no changes to the am peak gap of doom, no improvements to counter-peak. It's as if the politicians actually wrote the timetable.

And what did you honestly expect them to do? There were never going to be any peak hour service modifications. Counter peak is still during peak hour. Intra peak isn't during the night. They delivered 100% what they proposed and that was a 15 min intrapeak service.

This is the problem, only the minimum possible was done. Anywhere else in the world, a proper job would have been done.

It is possible to fix the inbound am peak around existing track slots. Fixing pm peak, and counter-peak require system-wide changes a la stage 2.

[somebody]

Can we please stop referring to it as a pork barrel?  We've gotten some of what we wanted!

I still don't understand why they have so much trouble writing a timetable.

[Arnz]

I actually think I would have preferred them to do it as part of the stage 2 timetable review, rather than delay that to implement the political promise. It's a load of BS when the media release announcing this improvement points out that peak hour has bigger gaps than off peak, and blames it on the previous government but does nothing to fix it and in fact made that sad point last longer by delaying the timetable review that would have fixed said abnormality to implement this pork barrel!

When it got to the stage that they've shifted what times past the hour the Shorncliffe trains leave Shorncliffe so they are different in the interpeak to the evening off peak (xx:12 and xx:42 during the day and xx:07 and xx:37 after 7pm), it went beyond focusing on implementing an election pork barrel, and into the territory of stuffing things up. Its only a small difference but what happened to having a consistent clock face timetable?

+1

Going by the journey planner it is as half-baked as we expected - goes from 15 min off-peak to 20 min gaps in peak, no extra late night train, no changes to the am peak gap of doom, no improvements to counter-peak. It's as if the politicians actually wrote the timetable.

And what did you honestly expect them to do? There were never going to be any peak hour service modifications. Counter peak is still during peak hour. Intra peak isn't during the night. They delivered 100% what they proposed and that was a 15 min intrapeak service.

This is the problem, only the minimum possible was done. Anywhere else in the world, a proper job would have been done.

It is possible to fix the inbound am peak around existing track slots. Fixing pm peak, and counter-peak require system-wide changes a la stage 2.

This is Qld, stephenk.  What do you expect? lol.  They weren't gonna promising anything outside of the intra-peak improvements, and like most state governments in Australia, somewhere else is screwed (the loss of even 15 min intra-peak frequency between NG and Alb to 8 min and 21 min gaps for example) to achieve it.

[Gazza]

Can we please stop referring to it as a pork barrel?  We've gotten some of what we wanted!

Agree with this.

A true Pork barrel would have been 15 minutes to Rosewood shuttle as a trial before the other lines.

But back when we had the sector 2 consultation with QR I remember saying "at the very least, 15 min offpeak should be done to FG, it has no freight, its a short line, and the catchement area has the density to warrant it".

[Golliwog]

Can we please stop referring to it as a pork barrel?  We've gotten some of what we wanted!

Agree with this.

A true Pork barrel would have been 15 minutes to Rosewood shuttle as a trial before the other lines.

But back when we had the sector 2 consultation with QR I remember saying "at the very least, 15 min offpeak should be done to FG, it has no freight, its a short line, and the catchement area has the density to warrant it".

Oh yeah, there's no denying it's warranted, what I have a problem with is getting QR to drop the other timetable stuff they were working on (stage 2, which would have benefited the 2nd half of the rail network) so they can implement this in a half arsed fashion. All they wanted was to be able to say "We promised this at the election, and we got it done in x time frame." with no worries to how this plays with everything else. How much better would it have been if instead of releasing the media release the other day announcing this, they released the first batch of new timetables for everyone on the Beenleigh, Ferny Grove, Cleveland, Gold Coast, Doomben, Airport and Shorncliffe lines to look at, and 6 months from now could announce that they've done all of that, implemented 15 minute frequency inter-peak (and we could have fought for evening/weekend in the consultation period) on the FG line and improved peak frequencies? Instead we got this release where they basically said "We couldn't be bothered doing anything with the peak hour timetable, because that couldn't be done right now, so deal with it. Oh and that's Labor's fault"  It seems to be becoming typical of this government that they do what they said they'd do in the shortest time frame possible with no thoughts to the consequences outside of the one thing they're working on, or that if they gave it a bit more time instead of just doing what they promised, they could deliver something so much better.

tl;dr I have no problem with 15 minute frequency on the Ferny Grove line, my issue is how they've gone about implementing it.

[somebody]

The putting back of the sector 2 revamp is not worth spending any more time talking about.

[Gazza]

Since its partially dependent on changes at Sandgate anyhow right?

[HappyTrainGuy]

Since its partially dependent on changes at Sandgate anyhow right?

Somewhat. But even then that'll get to a point down the line where something else is needed to get trains moving which has also been taken into account such as Banyo stabling, CRR and the Cartwright street Mayne-Ferny Grove corridor. The Sandgate mods are going to allow greater flexability in establishing overall paths and realibility compared to what is currently available on the Shorncliffe and other railway corridors. As a result Sandgate-Shorncliffe section can be pushed harder, bus/rail interchange can be improved as a result, more operational flexability for when other corridors meet/major trip interchanges (railway junctions, main stations/rail and bus interchange stations). There are eight main single line restrictions that have to be factored in for the timetable review (Keperra-Ferny Grove, the end bits of the Cleveland Corridor, the freight corridor (Yeerongpilly-Fishermans Island - remember its a 20km loop), Acacia Ridge freight corridor, Airport corridor, Helensvale-Coomera, Doomben corridor and the end of the Shorncliffe corridor) which is currently down to seven with the Ferny Grove duplication. Sandgate might not seem like its needed for a timetable review but the overall paths can play a huge part for other corridors. From what I've read from people about why they don't do this and that is quite amusing when there is just a huge amount of changes that has to be implimented for a timetable review. Some of the issues that I mostly notice people forgetting here are the freight paths that traverse multiple corridors eg the range using the Ipswich/Gold Coast/Beenleigh/Cleveland/Shorncliffe/Doomben corridor (grain trains are still allowed/might come back to use the Doomben corridor), NCL using the Gympie-Nambour-Caboolture/Ipswich/Cleveland/Beenleigh/Gold Coast corridor and level crossing downtimes which was a big part in Cabooltures timetable review. Just take a trip out to Geebung and Lawnton during off peak to see passenger trains meeting at level crossings at precise times. Peak hour is even more interesting with some out of service trains getting held prior to level crossings until they get the green light as other trains approach.

[somebody]

What I find amusing is the defence of the indefensible, one example being the 30 minute counter peak frequency at Ipswich.

[HappyTrainGuy]

I'm only explaining some of the things that have to be taken into account for a timetable review that people here sometimes seem to forget, didn't even know, don't want to accept or if they see spaces in a partially public available timetable/track diagrams assume that passenger trains can be run in those spaces. If I wanted to "defend the indefensible" as to why the Ipswich line has a counter peak of 30 minutes I'd use better information than a freight train going via Tennyson.

RTT, its quite a long and extensive process to go through. Level crossings have to be taken into account due to trains being able to close the level crossings for large periods of time and creating bad traffic congestion/safety issues directly surrounding the stations/level crossing. One problem with the Geebung level crossing was that during peak hour traffic could be backed right up from the level crossing back to Ellison road which caused safety issues with the nearby school and its after school/daycare centre. That inturned delayed the 325 (both ways), 326/327 (outbound) sometimes by up to 15-20 minutes as they attempted to clear it due to the busy roads feeding into it. Traffic then flowed towards the Sunshine level crossing which backed up towards Ellison road and traffic that flowed onto Murphy road then backed up from the Zillmere/Murphy Road intersection back to the school near there (delaying the 330 and the 327 again). People were also racing the lights outside Zillmere station due to the congestion. Due to the congestion created from the Geebung level crossing more people were then taking risks by racing the boomgates, remaining on the level crossing, running red lights, blocking intersections, rat running around streets from Geebung-Carseldine, traffic cleared to go past the station sometimes didn't adhere to the zebra crossing rules and a host of other issues. Timetable rewrites (which is why some fat was added here and there) for the level crossing downtimes has helped eased congestion, incidents around the stations and incidents regarding boomgate strikes but there are still those that will race them. The same has applied to other level crossings such as Lawnton (now has a precision cross during offpeak. Morning trains bound for Petrie-City services are held at the station/signal prior to the level crossing (Nambour-City and Petrie-City services cross the bridge in the same direction at the same time. When the level crossing activates that train then proceeds towards Petrie). It frequently had boomgate strikes due to congestion and people speeding across the level crossing/speeding across Gympie Road out of the road that goes under the South Pine Rive rail bridge to beat the level crossing - Francis road should help take some pressure off). Strathpine has lots of traffic stopping on the level crossing heading to Gympie Road and traffic swerving to use the usually slightly flooded underpass when the lights were activated (northbound train going slow following yellows struck a truck that stopped on the level crossing due to congestion along with frequent boomgate strikes from the same reason). Telegraph Road had its problem where the crosses were sort of random at times between inbound/outbound Caboolture/Nambour and freight services (still annoying now but not as bad as it was once before). Carseldine frequently has drivers racing the boomgates and damaging them (prior to the changes its cross was at the same time/within a minute or so but there were times where they could be closed for ~5-6 minutes at a time during off peak. Last week was the last time someone took them out). Geebung (now has a precision cross during offpeak. Shortly after the precision crosses came into effect a Northbound train going slow following yellows struck a pedistrian that jumped the gates after they were closed for a prolonged time - IIRC RS inbound exp closed them first, Northbound service passing thru Sunshine heading to Geebung going slow kept them closed, IPS stopped at the platform, ped confused the reason for the gates closed. Other reasons above). Burpengary still has those that race the gates from congestion at the roundabout but not like other stations close to the city (doesn't have a precision cross but its down to something like 2 mins difference between the inbound/outbound services arriving at the station). Narangba is similar to Burpengary (no precision cross but the time difference is about 5 minutes between inbound and outbound services). Northgates level crossing has skid marks/scrape marks on the road from cars/trucks flooring it only to bottom out when they get to the dip in the road/take out the boomgates. Banyo had drivers racing the boomgates/remining stopped on the level crossing during peak hour (not releated to the train vs truck incident the other week) but off peak the traffic flows evenly. Deagon tends to have more people jumping the gates rather than traffic incidents to the boomgates (the last serious incident that I know of was this year when some people jumped the gates infront of two trains forcing the outbound train to go into an emergency stop). During peak hours trains do tend to have more precision crosses. Carseldine is one station were trains can be seen stoped until a outbound passenger train activates the crossing before it leaves the station.

[somebody]

If the LX issues can be managed in peak, you can manage them with increased off peak trains, when there is less cars on the road.

[BrizCommuter]

13 days till the new FG timetable. Still no .pdf timetable on TransLink's website. In fact no specific webpage about the FG changes (only changes to other lines). Place your bets now on when TransLink will actually publish the .pdf timetables?

[BrizCommuter]

Shocker - TransLink release the new FG timetable 12 days before change (instead of 2 days late like last time). BrizCommuter has just fallen off his chair!
http://translink.com.au/resources/travel-information/network-information/timetables/121008-ferny-grove-line.pdf

Still no new timetables for the other affected lines though. Shorncliffe and Doomben Line users may have a shock in store if they are not aware of the new timings.

[BrizCommuter]

Oh no, replying to myself. The first sign of madness.

Anyway, here are 5 off-peak timetable myths busted by BrizCommuter.
http://brizcommuter.blogspot.com.au/2012/09/improving-off-peak-train-services-5.html

[Golliwog]

I suppose another question, where are the Park Road services going to terminate. Originally I was thinking Plat 4 but that would involve not allowing people on train to Plat 4. Assume its now Plat 3? To use three, the train will need to jump over the DG at Sth Brisbane, but can return via mains.

I'm not convinced it won't just turn around in platform 3. If you look at the non .pdf timetable, it has the Park Rd services using p3 in both directions and with a service arriving from FG ~8mins before a FG bound departure.

[BrizCommuter]

Shocker - TransLink release the new FG timetable 12 days before change (instead of 2 days late like last time). BrizCommuter has just fallen off his chair!
http://translink.com.au/resources/travel-information/network-information/timetables/121008-ferny-grove-line.pdf

Still no new timetables for the other affected lines though. Shorncliffe and Doomben Line users may have a shock in store if they are not aware of the new timings.

have to wonder how the 20min gaps between between some of the peak and off-peak breaks occur.

I'm sure with sufficent capital we could move away from this almost random timings in peak where the timetablers are trying to do the best with what they have to a more clockface service through out the day. ie 15min during day from 7am to 7pm. With extra peak services as needed slotted in uniformly. I'm sure pax could easily get use to the fact a train leaves there station at 00, 15, 30 and 45 from 6am to say 8pm at night 7 days a week very easily. With a extra services in peak dropped in between as needed.

Not sure of the advantage of running express services on the FG line, saves about 6min for the 6 stop miss service and 4min for the 4 stop. I assume this is driven by the need to turn trains at Mich due to lack of sets. Yes it is more efficent running 2 tier, but on a line with 11 stations?

BrizCommuter thinks that stage 2 will have more even peak times post FG duplication and Sandgate upgrade - probably based around a repeating 15 minute cycle. Cleveland Line may still have a few issues in avoiding random timetables due to the single track sections, and may well be a headache for the schedulers.

BrizCommuter is confident enough that QRs current schedulers will not continue the stupidity of FG Line expresses post stage 2. It's a big shame that they haven't been removed post duplication (particularly the pm peak expresses) - the extra time made up by not having to waiting at Keperra and FG for single track clearance could have been utilised to allow the trains to serve all stations on the outbound leg. Currently the pm peak FG timetable is so laughable that out of service trains trundle slowly behind all stations services, and one out of service train waits outside of Mitchelton for 7 minutes!

[Golliwog]

Shocker - TransLink release the new FG timetable 12 days before change (instead of 2 days late like last time). BrizCommuter has just fallen off his chair!
http://translink.com.au/resources/travel-information/network-information/timetables/121008-ferny-grove-line.pdf

Still no new timetables for the other affected lines though. Shorncliffe and Doomben Line users may have a shock in store if they are not aware of the new timings.

The guy who puts together the .pdf timetables probably wasn't on holidays this time.

[#Metro]

*rubbing eyes*

Wow, is it really true? 15 minute trains?

Disappointed that weekends and immediately after peak hour the services fall off a cliff - it is almost like they don't want it to succeed properly. Remember, the greatest increases in the BUZ network trial were on evenings and weekends ...

[Mr X]

Wow 15min trains.. Brisbane is so world class now eh? What a joke.

Meanwhile I was in London on the weekend and I'm currently in Paris. PT operates from early morning to late at night and is every 2-3mins on ALL lines, 5mins in "off peak", well patronised and very accessible... so frequent that there is no timetable (as in, none are actually published at the station!!).

Only issue is that the Paris metro is as slow as a snail.

People actually use it too. London underground on a Sunday and it's sardine conditions!

[ozbob]

Changes to routes 303, 367, 397/398 from 8 October

--> http://jp.translink.com.au/travel-information/service-updates/details/1347430316

[ozbob]

From the Brisbane mX 18 September 2012 page 2

More trains on the go

More trains on the go
Felicity Caldwell

COMMUTERS will soon be able to turn up and ''go'' at stations on the Ferny Grove train line, with more frequent services starting next month. Transport Minister Scott Emerson and Premier Campbell Newman today announced trains would arrive on the Ferny Grove line every 15 minutes starting from October 8. The new services, part of an LNP election commitment, mean there'll be 28 new train services a day between 9am and 3pm.

"For too long passengers on Brisbane public transport have paid too much for poor frequency," Newman said.

"However, a train every 15 minutes or better inbound and outbound on the Ferny Grove line during off peak on weekdays now means frequent public transport is never far away."

Emerson said new services would also operate through the CBD to Park Rd station on the Beenleigh line, providing more off-peak weekday options on the off-peak weekday options on the southern side of the river.

"Better frequency is the third plank of our strategy to get people back on to public transport," he said.

Meanwhile, a Griffith University urban researcher says a shake-up of public transport fares is necessary to encourage people back to buses and trains.

Griffith Uni's Jago Dodson said bringing back daily, weekly and monthly tickets, or "all you can eat" tickets, would help drive people back to public transport.

"It encourages passengers to show their loyalty to the system they're invested in by using it as much as they can," he said.

"Even though operators aren't recovering the cost of each additional trip taken for free, there's other benefits to the transport system including encouraging people out of cars."

[somebody]

Griffith Uni's Jago Dodson said bringing back daily, weekly and monthly tickets, or "all you can eat" tickets, would help drive people back to public transport.

An ally for ozbob's agenda!

[HappyTrainGuy]

+1

As a minister I'd be very careful about using the words "For too long passengers on Brisbane public transport have paid too much for poor frequency,"

so what are they doing about the other 7 lines on 30min and Doomben, Rosewood and SC on lessor?

What are they going to do about my two-hourly weekend services that finishes before sundown? Still not as bad as those that don't have Sunday/weekend services. Nambour line frequency problems my ass 

[ozbob]

Griffith Uni's Jago Dodson said bringing back daily, weekly and monthly tickets, or "all you can eat" tickets, would help drive people back to public transport.

An ally for ozbob's agenda!

Rubbish, enough of such insults thanks.  Your participation on this forum is on notice.

[ButFli]

I heard that at the direction of the Minister, the trains from Ferny Grove that terminate at Park Road will be extended to Yeerongpilly. No firm timeframe except that it will be soon. That's just what I heard.

[Gazza]

From what I understand, they want to extend, but cant without changing other timetables.

[BrizCommuter]

From what I understand, they want to extend, but cant without changing other timetables.

...is the long awaited stage 2 timetable finally upon us?

[somebody]

From what I understand, they want to extend, but cant without changing other timetables.

They could have gone to Corinda or Rocklea, in or out of service.

[SurfRail]

They could turn back at Tennyson or Corinda fairly easily.  Rocklea would need a platform built at the train refuge.

[ButFli]

From what I understand, they want to extend, but cant without changing other timetables.

I heard that all the necessary planning was done for this before the Ferny Grove increased frequency ever started. I heard that it was planned to go all the way to Yerongpilly from the start but for some very dopey reasons they decided not to. That's just what I heard.

[ozbob]

From what I understand, they want to extend, but cant without changing other timetables.

I heard that all the necessary planning was done for this before the Ferny Grove increased frequency ever started. I heard that it was planned to go all the way to Yerongpilly from the start but for some very dopey reasons they decided not to. That's just what I heard.

Yes, just too difficult without adjusting the rest of the TTs.  Polyticks ...

[BrizCommuter]

From what I understand, they want to extend, but cant without changing other timetables.

I heard that all the necessary planning was done for this before the Ferny Grove increased frequency ever started. I heard that it was planned to go all the way to Yerongpilly from the start but for some very dopey reasons they decided not to. That's just what I heard.

Reasons...
Air pressure too high?
Wrong type of sunshine?
Unable to terminate trains at stations beginning with Y?

[#Metro]

Yes, just too difficult without adjusting the rest of the TTs.  Polyticks ...

Metro Trains Melbourne (the one that is giving me 10 minute trains all day at the moment) does 2 major timetable reviews each year. QR struggles with just 1 in 13 years!!