Ideas for a greater public transport system

[Wilfy 2007]

Excellent ideas Ash-sv6. I fully agree about the Northfield line. How many buses and cars drive down Port Wakefield Rd, Main North Rd and Bridge Rd that go to the city. Thousands. A bus/rail interchange at the old Cavan, Pooraka and Northfield stations with park and ride facilites would be perfect. And it would make more use of the silly 1 hour Dry Creek train service. There is now all that surplus land where med density housing could be built around the stations.

Good to see somebody is putting down their good ideas.
On another forum I asaw a plan to upgrade the Adelaide Railway System to 11 lines. I saw this plan yesterday and I find it very impressive.

The idea of having park and ride facilites at Port Wakefield Road, Main North Road and Briens Road are a great Idea, BUt, you would need bridges over each of these roads because there needs to be no traffic hold ups. This line would also need to go further North West from Northfield.

If you are interested I have stated a SAR 2008 Website with some of my ideas on it.

The site is at,
http://www.freewebs.com/saroeight/

I am finding thread ver y interesting, thanks for all the info.

If you want to introduce light rail on some of the less patronised lines you then have the problem of changing Trams/Trains at some point.

Regards,

Brian Leedham.

[Wilfy 2007]

I just thought I would let you all know. 2 of the 6 2000 series railcars that have been withdrawn for 10 years are nearly ready to re enter service and were seen in Adelaide railway station this morning. 2003 and 2104 were the railcars seen and will soon be joined by 2103 to make a 3 car set. Another 3 car set formed of 2112-2006-2116 is still being worked on. It is more then likely that both sets will be used mainly on the Noarlunga line. One more 2000 class is stored and that is 2009 however, it is not going to see service being used for spare parts and is missing one power bogie and so is sitting on a normal freight bogie at one end.

The 2 3 cars sets are being given an overhaul and have been modified with brighter interiors (new paint and also new seat covers) but are generally as they were bar the 'Admet' yellow/red/blue livery. One would hope that an additional 6 railcars (boosting the total fleet for 93 to 99) will ease the congestion for a while down south.

409,

Why were they withdrawn for 10 years?

Has the refurbishment taken that long or was that something recent.

[PhilM]

The O'Bahn was about as visionary as the one way freeway and the tram to nowhere!

Scrap the lot and start with a clean sheet. A star network of light rail that initially goes to the main points such as Port Adelaide, Henley, Gawler, Golden Grove, Newton, Noarlunga and Glenelg. Create a bus interchange at each of the main end stations to service the suburbs. Bring the lot into a two way (clockwise/anti clockwise) underground 'circle line' doing KWS, North Tce, East Tce and South Terraces. Dig it in from above, close the individual roads completely for a year at a time if needs be!

Just think, one could catch the 9am train from Tea Tree Plaza to Glenelg, or wait for the 915 to the Port or the 9.30 to Noalunga etc. The Service does a lap of the City before heading South. There could be a train heading in each direction of the circle line every 5 minutes.

So how do we afford it? Well there is almost two Billion Dollars in cash sitting on the WorkCover balance sheet trying to offset the management incompetence that created the two and a half Billion liability. Fix the real problems in WorkCover and therein lies the cash foundation of a wonderful transport system!

Oh we also have a few pennies coming in from the GST so who cares if it costs another $250 Million a year for 20 years!

The real problem is that it will take 10-20 years to implement and that sadly goes way beyond the next election so is not deemed politically expedient! If only the ghost of Sir Thomas could inspire a politician from either party!

[Cruise]

One way to improve the train network would be to close down all the little shitty train stations no one uses. That way trains might actually reach a decent speed

[AG]

One way to improve the train network would be to close down all the little shitty train stations no one uses. That way trains might actually reach a decent speed

With the current condition of track on most lines, that still would do little to improve the situation of slow train services. Besides, express services can be run stopping only at the busiest stations anyway.

[Norman]

That's what express trains are for. And we first of all need fast trains in the first place

[Cruise]

but getting rid of the small unused stations would an end to maintenance costs of those stations.... Err hang on forget that, i forgot TransAdelaide never maintain their stations

[AtD]

How about we look at and address why these stations are unused as opposed to throwing them all in the too hard basket?

[Cruise]

I have a pefect example. Midlunga station on the Outer Harbour line. I think ive seen maybe half a dozen people use it in my time on trains.

[The_Q915]

How about we look at and address why these stations are unused as opposed to throwing them all in the too hard basket?

How do you propose they be brought to a reasonable usage level? Stations that have too low patranage should be closed. Trains are ment to travel long distances at high speeds. Stoppping every few hundred meteres should be left for buses. When they upgraded torrens road intersection they spend half a million dollars modyfying Ovingham station. In all my time I might of seen one or two people using it. The station should of been closed. There are alredy buses serving the area.

[AtD]

How do you propose they be brought to a reasonable usage level? Stations that have too low patranage should be closed. Trains are ment to travel long distances at high speeds. Stoppping every few hundred meteres should be left for buses. When they upgraded torrens road intersection they spend half a million dollars modyfying Ovingham station. In all my time I might of seen one or two people using it. The station should of been closed. There are alredy buses serving the area.

It depends on each station, case by case basis. When some of the stations are little more than bus shelters on an empty platform, it's no wonder people don't use them. Yes, some stations should be closed, but some are just neglected. Islington, for example, would probably get more people using it if it were connected to Regency Road. Every other weekday train runs limited stops on the Gawler line so your point of 'stopping every 100 metres" is irrelevant.

I know you like to argue absolutes, but you can't provide a one size fits all solution for transport; the world's not that simple.

[muzzamo]

The MATS plan proposed to close down many of the unused stations... I think if/when the government finally takes a planned a approach to reforming and upgrading our suburban network 10-30% of the stations will go, but new ones will pop up where there is a cost/benefit, eg an interchange at the end of the Tonsley line.

[AtD]

Yes please!

[AG]

There have been a few station closures over the past few years - 3 on the Belair Line (Clapham, Hawthorn and Millswood) for operational reasons in 1995, 2 on the Gawler Line (Tube Mills and Islington Works), and 1 on the Grange Line (Holdens), the latter 3 stations closed as the industrial facilities they served closed. Almost all the stations still open on the network have more potential patronage than the current patronage they currently have, which could be achieved by proper upgrades to the network infrastructure. Typically a good distance between adjacent stations is about 1km, sometimes a bit less is acceptable, but less than about 600m apart is too close.

There are a few stations that are too close together IMO and one should be built to compensate for the removal of two stations:

- Woodville, Woodville Park and Kilkenny are way too close together, there is about a 500m distance between the adjacent stations. Kilkenny should be rebuilt about 100m north-west from it's current location on the other side of Kilkenny Road and Woodville Park closed.

[Cruise]

My heavy rail line to west lakes involves closure of the Grange line.