News & Discussion: O-Bahn

[claybro]

I'd go further, and say that the whole of the Western suburbs are due for a revamp. All of Thebarton could be repurposed from light industrial and commercial to residential over 20-30 years. Similarly, the whole of Grange Road. Keswick to the airport as well could be somewhat more densely residential than at the moment.

With that in mind, either political party could come up with a 30 year plan to transform those Western suburbs.

In that case. Open spaces, transport corridors along Grange, Richmond, Henley Beach Roads and to and from the airport could easily be incorporated as part of a long term plan.

In that situation, Keswick Creek could be repurposed as a 'natural' waterway with a recreational flavour. Transport to the airport could be O-Bahn, or tram later, if the passenger numbers warranted. I can't ever see heavy rail being justified, but who knows? A corridor could be reserved.

I'm surprised that neither political party is doing this. With the right sort of development for a chosen demographic, a political party could heavily favour the types of voters in the West. It's now close into the city, and with revamped transport options and upgraded living, it could be very desirable for voters. It could change the political map of SA for generations.

If all the industrial and commercial property is converted to residential, where would all those people work? We're in the O-Bahn thread, so is the whole point just to generate demand for public transport from the inner residential suburbs to the outer suburban employment precincts?

There's a huge area available and suitable for light industrial and commercial in and around Dry Creek. It's massive. Close to the port. Close to rail. Close to road corridors.

What is the obsession in Adelaide with OBahn? Sure, it works ok in a previously reserved very wide corridor through the NE suburbs. But the ride is bumpy, rubber tyres noisy, and the track significantly more unsightly than light, or even heavy rail. It would have to be THE most unsuitable form of rapid transport for a fairly tight suburban environment that is the western suburbs of Adelaide.

[SBD]

If all the industrial and commercial property is converted to residential, where would all those people work? We're in the O-Bahn thread, so is the whole point just to generate demand for public transport from the inner residential suburbs to the outer suburban employment precincts?

There's a huge area available and suitable for light industrial and commercial in and around Dry Creek. It's massive. Close to the port. Close to rail. Close to road corridors.

What is the obsession in Adelaide with OBahn? Sure, it works ok in a previously reserved very wide corridor through the NE suburbs. But the ride is bumpy, rubber tyres noisy, and the track significantly more unsightly than light, or even heavy rail. It would have to be THE most unsuitable form of rapid transport for a fairly tight suburban environment that is the western suburbs of Adelaide.

So what public transport would you put from a repurposed Thebarton residential development to a Dry Creek industrial zone (I'm assuming on the old salt fields, not right next to the railway station)? Is there space for either O-Bahn or trams in the North-South Corridor?

[rev]

If all the industrial and commercial property is converted to residential, where would all those people work? We're in the O-Bahn thread, so is the whole point just to generate demand for public transport from the inner residential suburbs to the outer suburban employment precincts?

There's a huge area available and suitable for light industrial and commercial in and around Dry Creek. It's massive. Close to the port. Close to rail. Close to road corridors.

What is the obsession in Adelaide with OBahn? Sure, it works ok in a previously reserved very wide corridor through the NE suburbs. But the ride is bumpy, rubber tyres noisy, and the track significantly more unsightly than light, or even heavy rail. It would have to be THE most unsuitable form of rapid transport for a fairly tight suburban environment that is the western suburbs of Adelaide.

It's just the mental masturbations of people online no need to take it seriously.
There wont be another obahn built in Adelaide. Especially in the western/north western suburbs. There just isn't the room for it.
The only reason the current obahn remains in place is because of it's high usage. There's only a handful of guided busways in existence around the world anyway, it's not a widely used or popular form of mass transit. Why would it be, when if you're going to have a dedicated corridor for public transport, a train or tram can carry more passengers?

[abc]

If all the industrial and commercial property is converted to residential, where would all those people work? We're in the O-Bahn thread, so is the whole point just to generate demand for public transport from the inner residential suburbs to the outer suburban employment precincts?

There's a huge area available and suitable for light industrial and commercial in and around Dry Creek. It's massive. Close to the port. Close to rail. Close to road corridors.

What is the obsession in Adelaide with OBahn? Sure, it works ok in a previously reserved very wide corridor through the NE suburbs. But the ride is bumpy, rubber tyres noisy, and the track significantly more unsightly than light, or even heavy rail. It would have to be THE most unsuitable form of rapid transport for a fairly tight suburban environment that is the western suburbs of Adelaide.

its more rubberman's obsession than the whole town's

[1NEEDS2POST]

There's a huge area available and suitable for light industrial and commercial in and around Dry Creek. It's massive. Close to the port. Close to rail. Close to road corridors.

What is the obsession in Adelaide with OBahn? Sure, it works ok in a previously reserved very wide corridor through the NE suburbs. But the ride is bumpy, rubber tyres noisy, and the track significantly more unsightly than light, or even heavy rail. It would have to be THE most unsuitable form of rapid transport for a fairly tight suburban environment that is the western suburbs of Adelaide.

It's just the mental masturbations of people online no need to take it seriously.
There wont be another obahn built in Adelaide. Especially in the western/north western suburbs. There just isn't the room for it.
The only reason the current obahn remains in place is because of it's high usage. There's only a handful of guided busways in existence around the world anyway, it's not a widely used or popular form of mass transit. Why would it be, when if you're going to have a dedicated corridor for public transport, a train or tram can carry more passengers?

Single lane bus lanes can carry almost as many passengers as light rail.

It's much cheaper to build an O-Bahn than a railway, the cost comparison isn't close. The only alternative to an O-Bahn that is close in cost is a dedicated road for buses.
The other huge advantage of O-Bahns is that buses can continue on normal roads at the end of the O-Bahn. It can service a much larger area than railways.

[abc]

What is the obsession in Adelaide with OBahn? Sure, it works ok in a previously reserved very wide corridor through the NE suburbs. But the ride is bumpy, rubber tyres noisy, and the track significantly more unsightly than light, or even heavy rail. It would have to be THE most unsuitable form of rapid transport for a fairly tight suburban environment that is the western suburbs of Adelaide.

It's just the mental masturbations of people online no need to take it seriously.
There wont be another obahn built in Adelaide. Especially in the western/north western suburbs. There just isn't the room for it.
The only reason the current obahn remains in place is because of it's high usage. There's only a handful of guided busways in existence around the world anyway, it's not a widely used or popular form of mass transit. Why would it be, when if you're going to have a dedicated corridor for public transport, a train or tram can carry more passengers?

Single lane bus lanes can carry almost as many passengers as light rail.

It's much cheaper to build an O-Bahn than a railway, the cost comparison isn't close. The only alternative to an O-Bahn that is close in cost is a dedicated road for buses.
The other huge advantage of O-Bahns is that buses can continue on normal roads at the end of the O-Bahn. It can service a much larger area than railways.

its 6km ffs
its not going to be any better than a bus

[claybro]

What is the obsession in Adelaide with OBahn? Sure, it works ok in a previously reserved very wide corridor through the NE suburbs. But the ride is bumpy, rubber tyres noisy, and the track significantly more unsightly than light, or even heavy rail. It would have to be THE most unsuitable form of rapid transport for a fairly tight suburban environment that is the western suburbs of Adelaide.

It's just the mental masturbations of people online no need to take it seriously.
There wont be another obahn built in Adelaide. Especially in the western/north western suburbs. There just isn't the room for it.
The only reason the current obahn remains in place is because of it's high usage. There's only a handful of guided busways in existence around the world anyway, it's not a widely used or popular form of mass transit. Why would it be, when if you're going to have a dedicated corridor for public transport, a train or tram can carry more passengers?

Single lane bus lanes can carry almost as many passengers as light rail.

It's much cheaper to build an O-Bahn than a railway, the cost comparison isn't close. The only alternative to an O-Bahn that is close in cost is a dedicated road for buses.
The other huge advantage of O-Bahns is that buses can continue on normal roads at the end of the O-Bahn. It can service a much larger area than railways.

Unfortunately for OBahn, it relies on complete separation from road, and pedestrians to be really successful. The bulky track width required for concrete footings, means a much wider corridor is required. Grade separation at all crossing points are required, unless the bus were to leave the guideway to cross a road. Pedestrians can’t cross an OBahn track, and so every pedestrian crossing needs an over/underpass. Go and have a ride along the bikeway adjacent the OBahn, the track up close really is monstrous, and then ride along the Glenelg tramway, and see the difference in how they interface with their surroundings. Also trams can be coupled, as is often the case in Europe, creating much higher capacity. There is simply no way, an OBahn would even fit into the Western Suburbs urban landscape. Nor for that matter would heavy rail to the airport, leaving express bus lanes, light rail or underground heavy rail the only options.

[dbl96]

Also, I think you will find that "double lane busway" means two lanes in each direction rather than one lane in each direction. The current O-Bahn is a "single lane busway" by this definition. The point is that (like for trams and trains), capacity on a single busway track in a given direction is limited by the fact that the buses get stuck behind each other. They have to leave a certain clearance behind the bus in front, and they can't overtake each other. All of that limits the number of buses you can run in a given time period.

At any rate, once you are stretching a busway to its upper capacity limits, you have to ask yourself whether it is really an efficient way of doing things. If you are running individual buses every 30 seconds or so, each with its own driver, you have to buy an awful lot of buses, and pay an awful lot of drivers. It starts to get to the point where the operational costs would outweigh whatever savings you might have made by building the busway compared to a higher capacity rail line. Not to mention the fact that the more moving parts (individual buses) you have in the system, the higher the chance that something will go wrong, gridlocking the whole system.

There is a reason why rail has been favoured around the world for mass transit. Busways have their place, but that place has typically been as a cheaper alternative to rail in places which can't afford to build a metro or similar system.

[Saltwater]

The reason the oBahn works so well is because it serves a limited number of nodes (Klemzig, Paradise, TTP) with large distances between them, and buses can divert onto local routes through low density suburbs from any one of those nodes. The collection of many bus routes means services become frequent, making it more attractive as a PT option for those closer to the nodes.

The Inner west is vastly different. People are embarking and disembarking from buses along the Henley Beach Road and Sir Don Bradman Drive at regular stops, for schools, medical appointments, employment, and loads of other things. Removing buses from these routes and diverting them to an oBahn style track that might stop once or twice in the inner western suburbs before reaching the airport or heading to Glenelg / West Lakes just doesn't make any sense.

[abc]

if you were going to build any express service between the airport and the CBD, a monorail would be the best option

not that I'm advocating any of it because its just 6kms and not worth the investment

[rubberman]

The reason the oBahn works so well is because it serves a limited number of nodes (Klemzig, Paradise, TTP) with large distances between them, and buses can divert onto local routes through low density suburbs from any one of those nodes. The collection of many bus routes means services become frequent, making it more attractive as a PT option for those closer to the nodes.

The Inner west is vastly different. People are embarking and disembarking from buses along the Henley Beach Road and Sir Don Bradman Drive at regular stops, for schools, medical appointments, employment, and loads of other things. Removing buses from these routes and diverting them to an oBahn style track that might stop once or twice in the inner western suburbs before reaching the airport or heading to Glenelg / West Lakes just doesn't make any sense.

It doesn't make sense as things are now. Absolutely correct.

However, if one day in the future, a government actually plans a wide scale urban consolidation rather than talk about it, then all options can be put on the table: heavy or light rail, O-Bahn or standard buses.

That's because a real urban consolidation would involve large areas of demolition of existing housing and road infrastructure. In that case, there's a real case for some serious change that could justify those options.

Of course, that relies on governments being serious about urban consolidation, and actually following up on its press releases.

In the meantime, O-Bahn, heavy and light rail are just pipe dreams. As pointed out, with the present urban density and transport infrastructure, it's never going to be worthwhile.

[abc]

a monorail could go straight down the middle of Bradman Drive... no demolition required... it would be the cheapest PT corridor option

[dbl96]

The reason the oBahn works so well is because it serves a limited number of nodes (Klemzig, Paradise, TTP) with large distances between them, and buses can divert onto local routes through low density suburbs from any one of those nodes. The collection of many bus routes means services become frequent, making it more attractive as a PT option for those closer to the nodes.

The Inner west is vastly different. People are embarking and disembarking from buses along the Henley Beach Road and Sir Don Bradman Drive at regular stops, for schools, medical appointments, employment, and loads of other things. Removing buses from these routes and diverting them to an oBahn style track that might stop once or twice in the inner western suburbs before reaching the airport or heading to Glenelg / West Lakes just doesn't make any sense.

This is actually my biggest gripe with the current O-Bahn - we have a brilliant public transport right of way corridor through to the north-east, but it doesn’t actually serve most of the communities along the route, especially in the inner city sections. Important centres like Walkerville, Marden, Campbelltown and Dernancourt are bypassed, and don’t really benefit from close proximity to high quality public transport. People catching public transport in those places mostly end up on buses travelling along the traffic clogged Northeast and Payneham Roads. If the northeast corridor has been built as a railway as originally intended rather than an express busway, you can be sure that it would have had stations at these places.

Even if we keep the O-Bahn as a busway, we need to look at how we can better use the corridor to service and interconnect these bypassed suburbs. The wider Campbelltown district is one of the fastest growing areas of the established metro area, and has been densifying fast, as townhouses proliferate. There are real opportunities to orient these communities around transit, but as it is, most of the new residents just end up driving - turning Payneham road into a car park.

[SBD]

The reason the oBahn works so well is because it serves a limited number of nodes (Klemzig, Paradise, TTP) with large distances between them, and buses can divert onto local routes through low density suburbs from any one of those nodes. The collection of many bus routes means services become frequent, making it more attractive as a PT option for those closer to the nodes.

The Inner west is vastly different. People are embarking and disembarking from buses along the Henley Beach Road and Sir Don Bradman Drive at regular stops, for schools, medical appointments, employment, and loads of other things. Removing buses from these routes and diverting them to an oBahn style track that might stop once or twice in the inner western suburbs before reaching the airport or heading to Glenelg / West Lakes just doesn't make any sense.

This is actually my biggest gripe with the current O-Bahn - we have a brilliant public transport right of way corridor through to the north-east, but it doesn’t actually serve most of the communities along the route, especially in the inner city sections. Important centres like Walkerville, Marden, Campbelltown and Dernancourt are bypassed, and don’t really benefit from close proximity to high quality public transport. People catching public transport in those places mostly end up on buses travelling along the traffic clogged Northeast and Payneham Roads. If the northeast corridor has been built as a railway as originally intended rather than an express busway, you can be sure that it would have had stations at these places.

Even if we keep the O-Bahn as a busway, we need to look at how we can better use the corridor to service and interconnect these bypassed suburbs. The wider Campbelltown district is one of the fastest growing areas of the established metro area, and has been densifying fast, as townhouses proliferate. There are real opportunities to orient these communities around transit, but as it is, most of the new residents just end up driving - turning Payneham road into a car park.

Are these areas served by O-Bahn buses that join/leave the corridor at the next downstream node? That would seem to be the way to use it well - no need for big park-and-ride, an efficient corridor for the express section and fanning out to provide acceptable single-vehicle travel from the end of your street.

[Nort]

a monorail could go straight down the middle of Bradman Drive... no demolition required... it would be the cheapest PT corridor option

Unironically agree and have thought in the past this would be brilliant, and on Grote Street could connect to a city loop.

There's an alternate universe where it was built at some point and is beloved and well used now, but unfortunately it's unrealistic to suggest monorails as a serious option due to the problems with how Sydney did theirs, and The Simpsons making for easy attacks on anyone who suggests it.