Metro network expansion

[Glen]

It’s not just about alignment, rolling stock etc. Sydney Trains has gone down a path of slower and slower services, both to satisfy political direction (prioritising on time running over journey time) and also, I suspect, a reflection of the decades old preference to import British senior management. How else to explain the lethargic defensive driving, similar to that which has infected the British rail network? Get on a train in some other states, and acceleration and particularly braking into stations is completely different to that of Sydney Trains.

Absolutely. I've retrieved the below from a post of mine from several years ago.

I like to go back to my 1938 timetable and that's how you see where we’ve really lost it.

Some of the best (worst) examples are on all stations off-peak and weekend running on steep uphill routes.

For example, Central to Hornsby Shore all stations:

1938 44 mins
1949 45
1958 47
1960 46
1973 46
1980 45
1984 41
1992 44
2000 45
2004 47
2005 51
2017 51

Remember, in 1938 we are talking about two-motor Leeds Forge and Bradfield ex-steam cars whining up and over the Harbour Bridge!

Wynyard to Hornsby Main, express Redfern – Burwood:

1938 55 mins
1949 55
1958 57
1960 57
1973 57
1980 54
1984 51
1992 53
2000 54
2004 57
2005 58
2017 59 (equiv)

Nobody is ever going to convince me that there is ANY excuse for that appalling result, after the millions of dollars that have been spent on “upgrading”. It’s simply a disgrace.

Even Central - Bankstown all stations … was 31 mins in 1938, now it is 36 mins.

Wynyard - Strathfield all stations … was 27 mins in 1938, now it is 32 mins.

Wynyard - Liverpool via Granville, express Redfern – Burwood … was 55 mins in 1938, now it is 62 mins.

Need I go on?

[tonyp]

There is another factor however. Note how the trains more or less kept a similar running time from the 1930s to around 2000, then it started slipping and the slipping progressively got worse. The deliberate slowdown of the early 2000s was certainly an issue, but journey times should have then plateaued at a new level set by the slower timetables. However, there was a major concurrent issue - the population explosion (immigration) from around 2000 until covid struck. Prior to this, patronage had been roughly stagnant for about the previous 30 years, sitting on a plateau that didn't trouble the double deckers nor the old single deckers that continued to run until about 1990. After 2000, the results of the population boom progressively flowed on to public transport patronage which started climbing and then rose prodigiously after around 2011.

This placed rapidly increasing pressure to perform on the double deck system, with all its passenger-processing handicaps, and, of course, with only two doors per car and stairs that inhibited passenger flows, perform it didn't. If the railway mandarins hadn't already slowed down performance, this huge patronage growth would have slowed it down for them and the late running stats would have been news all over the media. The deliberate slowing down in the early 2000s might have been senseless at that time, but the bureaucrats must have been grateful for the extra padding when the passenger tsunami hit in full force in the 2010s.

Of course, then covid hit and patronage plummeted and still hasn't recovered and there could be some argument for speeding up the timetable now that there isn't so much pressure on the system. But what will come in years ahead? Will metro permanently slice off a sizeable chunk of patronage from 2024? Will a degree of work-from-home become the norm? There will be an opportunity for a reset to the suburban system in the next few years, but it won't perform as well as the metro for as long as it has double deckers.

My hope for the longer term is that the suburban system will improve its functionality and productivity by phasing across, line by line, to ATO or ATC/ATP using three-door single deck trains based on the Melbourne HCMT and its seating capacity/configuration. The double deckers should be phased back to the two lines exceeding 30 km from Sydney, the Campbelltown and Penrith (and maybe Richmond) services, semi-expressing between Sydney Central and Revesby /Blacktown. Those surviving double deck operations can be blended into the interurban double deck operation.

For the rest, those high-performance single deck trains at the closer headways that the automation should enable should be the standard train and exclusive users of the city circle in order to maximise its efficiency. First cabs off the rank for single deck I think should be the ESR/Illawarra and Airport and East Hills line, local tracks to Revesby. (Campbelltown double deck service to use the Illawarra to Central terminus rather than the Airport line.)

Much detail to fill in but the those are the bones of what I see as the optimal future for the suburban system. However, that stage one of the metro should be completed too in order to fill in the basic grid. The cross-suburban metro links shown in the 2056 plan can come at the next stage.

[In Transit]

I think there's another aspect to the lethargic state of Sydney Trains - a deliberate approach to slow, defensive driving. This has developed as a feature of British rail operations over the last couple of decades, and perhaps Sydney is showing another result of its long term obsession with British expat management.

Seeing as Perth is often quoted, let's use that as an example. If you get on a train there, you'll find a markedly different driving style. Trains enter platforms faster and accelerate more rapidly than in Sydney. It's been a while since I've been on a train in Melbourne, but they certainly are also driven a lot harder in my experience. Of course, there's no need to drive beyond a snails pace in Sydney given the padded timetables, but there's now an embedded culture of slow operation. Slow braking. Slow dwells. Slow departures. Slow timetables.

[tonyp]

I think there's another aspect to the lethargic state of Sydney Trains - a deliberate approach to slow, defensive driving. This has developed as a feature of British rail operations over the last couple of decades, and perhaps Sydney is showing another result of its long term obsession with British expat management.

Seeing as Perth is often quoted, let's use that as an example. If you get on a train there, you'll find a markedly different driving style. Trains enter platforms faster and accelerate more rapidly than in Sydney. It's been a while since I've been on a train in Melbourne, but they certainly are also driven a lot harder in my experience. Of course, there's no need to drive beyond a snails pace in Sydney given the padded timetables, but there's now an embedded culture of slow operation. Slow braking. Slow dwells. Slow departures. Slow timetables.

Hopefully automated train operation can rectify that (except the dwells on double deckers). There have been a few "cab" videos on Youtube with a speedometer where you can see the difference between driving styles of Sydney metro and suburban trains. Ideally, the train should accelerate directly to line speed, then hold line speed unwaveringly until decelerating into the station, like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i41_qkVYpO4&t

On a suburban or interurban train it's like riding with one of those annoying car drivers who pumps the accelerator on/off constantly. Even at what should be line speed, the needle wobbles around over a range of maybe 10 km/h, even more. So automation should improve that one and enable a faster trip. The rest is down to replacing double deckers with single deckers with more doors, except on those 30 km+ trips where double deckers do what they do best - not stopping at all!

Watch the section between Waterfall and Sutherland, which should be a good section, after 1 hour 26 min, it's all over the shop:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQo9t0wKGNA&t

The double deck service traverses this section at 1.12 km/minute or average 67 km/h. The metro traverses the similar Epping-Cherrybrook stretch at 1.55 km/min, average 93 km/h, in spite of a 15 km/h lower (100 km/h) maximum speed limit. As you can see, the interurban was even exceeding the 115 km/h speed limit in blips, but still had a lower average speed.

My recollection of British trains was that they were quite fast and nippy, but maybe the culture has changed in recent years.

[Linto63]

Some people appear to lead very busy lives with every minute counting. Here I was thinking I was being a bit high maintenance because it took five hours and three trains to get from Newcastle to Central this afternoon while NSW TrainLink worked out if a V set could be attached to an H set.

I think there's another aspect to the lethargic state of Sydney Trains - a deliberate approach to slow, defensive driving. This has developed as a feature of British rail operations over the last couple of decades, and perhaps Sydney is showing another result of its long term obsession with British expat management.

While Britain does suffer from health & safety overkill, unless things have changed in the last three years, hasn't impacted train speeds. Aside from where there are physical impediments, London Underground trains arrive at platforms at full speed and then throw down the anchors. Don't muck about taking off either. Never noticed it to be slow on the main line either. You don't get a DMU from zero to 200km/h in four minutes by pussyfooting about. Can't say that I have ever felt slow driving was ever a feature of British rail operations, aside from when approaching a solid object, but after a few catastrophes, e.g. Moorgate, understandable.

[matthewg]

[
Hopefully automated train operation can rectify that (except the dwells on double deckers). There have been a few "cab" videos on Youtube with a speedometer where you can see the difference between driving styles of Sydney metro and suburban trains. Ideally, the train should accelerate directly to line speed, then hold line speed unwaveringly until decelerating into the station, like this:
{/quote]

Except it doesn't - or at least it didn't last time I rode it, it was still badly tuned. Yes the level sections it does manage to run smoothly, but give it any 'difficult' conditions it hunts flipping between full power and full brake. This has resulted in the rail corrugating and them needing to get the rail grinders out. Even non rail fans (but technology-savvy, robotics major uni students I work with) have commented about the lack of finesse in the control system of the Sydney Metro.
The system was designed for an 80km top speed, not 100 and it's messed with the control system optimisations. The system chosen for Sydney was far from 'state of the art'. The government asked for a 'proven system' so they got an older system - but then asked for 100km top speed instead of the 80 the system had been optimised for.

Sydney suburban trains are DELIBERATELY run way below what the trains can perform to ensure that they keep 'on time running'. Also since the advent of data loggers and management issuing bungs to drivers the datalogger has dobbed in for speeding, most drivers take the conservative approach to ensure they will never blip over line speed and have the logger report them.

The system is run to meet the SLA imposed by the government, not to get us passengers from point A to point B quickly and efficiently.

I hope Invensys gets the signalling contract for the other metros - I've experienced their system doing things like anticipating curves and changes in grade and cutting off power early to avoid the need to brake heavily and things like that. Other Alstom systems I've been on show the same tendency I've observed in Sydney - charge at a curve at full power then brake hard for the curve, full power up a grade, crest the grade and then brake hard to prevent an over speed as they crest the gate instead of cutting power early and letting the speed drop 'naturally'.

I'm sure the better-tuned system uses less power too, so should be cheaper in the long term to run.

It's been over a year since I last had to use the Metro, maybe Alstom has been working on the tuning of the control loops.

[Merc1107]

Discussion around the relative smoothness of the Metro has me wondering, how smooth was the ATO 1967 Stock on the London Underground, and how might that compare to the Metro in Sydney which (should be) vastly superior?

[tonyp]

Except it doesn't - or at least it didn't last time I rode it, it was still badly tuned. Yes the level sections it does manage to run smoothly, but give it any 'difficult' conditions it hunts flipping between full power and full brake. This has resulted in the rail corrugating and them needing to get the rail grinders out. Even non rail fans (but technology-savvy, robotics major uni students I work with) have commented about the lack of finesse in the control system of the Sydney Metro.
The system was designed for an 80km top speed, not 100 and it's messed with the control system optimisations. The system chosen for Sydney was far from 'state of the art'. The government asked for a 'proven system' so they got an older system - but then asked for 100km top speed instead of the 80 the system had been optimised for.

Sydney suburban trains are DELIBERATELY run way below what the trains can perform to ensure that they keep 'on time running'. Also since the advent of data loggers and management issuing bungs to drivers the datalogger has dobbed in for speeding, most drivers take the conservative approach to ensure they will never blip over line speed and have the logger report them.

The system is run to meet the SLA imposed by the government, not to get us passengers from point A to point B quickly and efficiently.

I hope Invensys gets the signalling contract for the other metros - I've experienced their system doing things like anticipating curves and changes in grade and cutting off power early to avoid the need to brake heavily and things like that. Other Alstom systems I've been on show the same tendency I've observed in Sydney - charge at a curve at full power then brake hard for the curve, full power up a grade, crest the grade and then brake hard to prevent an over speed as they crest the gate instead of cutting power early and letting the speed drop 'naturally'.

I'm sure the better-tuned system uses less power too, so should be cheaper in the long term to run.

It's been over a year since I last had to use the Metro, maybe Alstom has been working on the tuning of the control loops.

My post before the one you're quoting addresses the subject of how suburban trains are operated nowadays. Basically, while the initial slowdown was excessive, population (hence patronage) growth in the last decade rendered the suburban system unable to perform any better because it became overloaded. Now that patronage has fallen radically, there may be an opportunity to improve running times, but then we don't know to what extent patronage will grow again. Also the first major metro line will come into the picture next year and this will radically alter the operational parameters of the suburban system. In addition, going by the performance of the much-vaunted Paris RER A, even with upgraded signalling and some automation, you're not going to get much better performance out of double deckers. The metro will still have the legs on the long runs.

Sounds like you need to ride the metro again, I haven't noticed any of those issues. The Metropolis trains have a design speed of 120 km/h. Service speed is confined to 100 km/h in Sydney because that's the practical optimum needed for highest average speed vis a vis the station spacings. If they planned for that service speed I'm sure they weren't stupid enough to not design the CBTC for that.

Events of the past few days remind us of the importance of getting that basic metro grid in place as quickly as possible so that Sydney has a reliable rail system spread across all sectors of the city (except Illawarra/ Eastern Suburbs initially) as a failsafe against the whole, or major parts of the city grinding to a halt. Minns' intention to drop the Metro West and Bankstown line extensions from the grid would be a major blunder.

[Linto63]

Except it doesn't - or at least it didn't last time I rode it, it was still badly tuned. Yes the level sections it does manage to run smoothly, but give it any 'difficult' conditions it hunts flipping between full power and full brake.

Will concur with that.

Events of the past few days remind us of the importance of getting that basic metro grid in place as quickly as possible so that Sydney has a reliable rail system spread across all sectors of the city

Events of the past week have shown a lack or resilience in the current system. What is needed is to spend tens of millions fixing what we have rather than tens of billions on projects partly duplicating what we already have.

Minns' intention to drop the Metro West and Bankstown line extensions from the grid would be a major blunder.

Business cases would have been poor. With the era of cheap cash over and neither side prepared to sell assets to fund, cuts have to be made. A reelected Liberal government wouldn't be building all four.

[tonyp]

Events of the past week have shown a lack or resilience in the current system. What is needed is to spend tens of millions fixing what we have rather than tens of billions on projects partly duplicating what we already have.

Thank goodness you're not in charge of the city's transport but, not to worry, any Labor government that comes along will do that job to your satisfaction. We've been "fixing" resilience in the suburban system for decades and the more we try to fix it, the less resilient it becomes. It's a vast and never-ending money hole. Governments (or at least better governments) have a fiduciary duty to taxpayers. There's a point after which a government needs to stop throwing good money after bad and come up with an alternative. For trains, the metro is that alternative. With ongoing lifetime costs to taxpayers radically reduced, that should free up more money for schools, hospitals, services etc.

Business cases would have been poor. With the era of cheap cash over and neither side prepared to sell assets to fund, cuts have to be made. A reelected Liberal government wouldn't be building all four.

Lucky that you've made the decision for all of us now. That'll stop any future government wasting time studying it and free up their time so they can devote all their attention to suburban system collapses.

[Linto63]

Discussion around the relative smoothness of the Metro has me wondering, how smooth was the ATO 1967 Stock on the London Underground, and how might that compare to the Metro in Sydney which (should be) vastly superior?

Pretty rough as I recall, although it was 30 years old when I first travelled on it. Tended to bounce along and final stops were sometimes less than smooth and with air vents on the top of the windows, a fair bit of noise.

Thank goodness you're not in charge of the city's transport

Likewise

We've been "fixing" resilience in the suburban system for decades and the more we try to fix it, the less resilient it becomes. It's a vast and never-ending money hole.

It's a never ending problem, but the idea that it could all be replaced by metro lines is totally unrealistic.

Lucky that you've made the decision for all of us now. That'll stop any future government wasting time studying it and free up their time so they can devote all their attention to suburban system collapses.

Not a case of me deciding, but a case of being realistic as to what can be achieved. Labor would have been briefed by TfNSW, officially or unofficially, on the pecking order for the proposed lines and factored it in when formulating its policy. Spending $100 million on business cases that won't be actioned anytime soon is piddling money up the wall.

[tonyp]

It's a never ending problem, but the idea that it could all be replaced by metro lines is totally unrealistic.

Not replaced but supplemented by. This will provide a lot of redundancy so that people can still move around much of Sydney by train when the suburban system goes down in whole or part. Rail replacement buses have no chance of replacing the capacity of a downed train line. Most people just hop in their cars. If they can drive to their nearest metro line it's a hell of a lot better than driving all the way to their destination.

In the very long term, the suburban network will all be replaced by automated systems. The operating costs, which are underwritten by taxpayers, are unsustainable. Metro has been built from a combination of asset sales and capitalising on the land on which stations sit, so capex hasn't been loaded on taxpayers. The ongoing operating costs are much lower than the suburban and it has been suggested that the metro will deliver sufficient return to break even on operating costs. This will never happen with the suburban system as it stands. This opex drain on taxpayers ultimately can't be justified when there's a far better alternative.

It still needs that complete first stage metro framework. I very much doubt that TfNSW would have briefed Labor that parts of it are not necessary when they themselves have determined that it's necessary. The coordinated business cases are necessary to determine the order of priorities for building lines. If you leave two out of the assessment, you're not getting the overall picture.

[Randomness]

https://www.facebook.com/groups/5440211 ... 845071930/

Yep, still having that overshooting issue. Also a good demonstration of the problems with full power/brake.
Wouldn't completely write off the metro though, still quite a rare issue and only takes ~5 min to rectify (should be lower regardless).

[Fleet Lists]

What relevance does have with the Metro expansion?
Unless explained, it will be removed.

[Merc1107]

It would seem to follow from a discussion that began in this post further up the page

[Randomness]

Yes, that one and some easier discussions about teething issues that still go on today. Sorry for not clarifying.

[Fleet Lists]

I will leave it but I do think it was off topic.

[tonyp]

Rapid transit rail tech is really not a subject for discussion any longer. It has been well proven over many years now and is widely accepted as a best methodology for urban commuter rail.

The framework for discussion of this topic is the network outlined in the 2056 transport plan that proposes restructuring Sydney's rail network from a hub and spoke network focussed on the City of Sydney and, to an extent, secondarily on Parramatta, to a grid network spread across the three cities - eastern, central and western - enabling fast all-stops travel between any centres or sub-centres with interchange from and to very frequent services.

So the metro network is overlaid on the suburban network and they are intended to complement each other. The first complete stage of the metro network is this, shown overlaid on the suburban network:

The complete stage envisaged for 2056 is this, aptly blended in this diagram to demonstrate the integrated essence of it and to discourage any impression of it as being two separate, unrelated systems:

The significant centres are identified on this diagram and note that the thin lines are bus corridors, not rail.

On this diagram, the stage 1 metro lines are:

. The perimeter circle - the City and NW line, the line from Tallawong to WSA, the link from WSA to Bankstown via Glenfield and Liverpool and the Bankstown line.
. The Macarthur line from WSA.
. The east-west aligned West Metro from City of Sydney to WSA via Olympic Park and Parramatta.

The stage 2 metro lines on this diagram are:

. Extension of West Metro to Malabar/La Perouse via Green Square and Randwick.
. Randwick-Sydney Airport-Kogarah-Miranda.
. Kogarah-Kingsgrove-Bankstown-Parramatta.
. Parramatta-Epping and Parramatta-Norwest, either of which could be an extension of the line from Kogarah, or not.

Stage 2 lines are likely to be subject to further planning refinement. Stage 1 lines are considered essential to have in place at the outset, though I would suggest that the WSA-Macarthur line is more a case of political priority rather than necessary at the outset of the network.

[stajourneyman]

Has there been any discussion/debate on the path of the future metro connection between Tallawong and St Marys thus far?

I ask because looking at Google maps it would seem that there is an above ground path that it could take largely without interference with existing housing etc in the area.

I am guessing that it’s path would continue southwest from Tallawong running alongside Schofields Rd, flying over (and connecting with) the conventional Richmond railway line, then continuing alongside South St.

It would presumably then fly over Richmond Rd, continue alongside South St before continuing through the paddocks, flying over the (yet to be built) Castlereagh freeway and then aligning itself along the eastern edge of Peter Van Hassett Park between the Mount Druitt suburbs of Shalvey and Willmot.

This would then line it up to fly over Palmyra Ave and onto an existing reservation that runs alongside the western edge of Forrester Rd. It would continue along this alignment until reaching the point where Forrester bends south and heads directly to the existing St Marys railway station.

I imagine that it would either then go underground under Forrester Rd to the station, or else drop into the old Ropes Creek railway cutting that still exists beside Forrester Rd where it turns south.

From there the new line could traverse the old Ropes Creek line beside Christie St, Dunheved, cross Christie St around the back of Simsmetal onto existing railway land leading into St Marys station.

I dare say this will be close to what eventuates.

Now..what perplexes me, and has done for several years now, is that there is also a long narrow neck of unused parkland that runs through the middle of Mt Druitt area. It starts between Bidwill and Shalvey and runs southwest between Emerton and Lethbridge Park, then continuing between Tregaron and Whalan and finishing up at the main western railway line between Mount Druitt and St Marys railway stations.

This land is basically maintained grassland with massive high tension wire towers along it. It is sectioned off by metal piping posts that are basically there to keep cars and motorbikes out. It has several places where the piping gates can be unlocked and slid open when necessary.

The point is that that on quite a few occasions over recent years, I, and family members, have sighted NSW Railcorp (or similar name) vehicles on this land, having obtained a key for access.

So.. my question is, what would they be doing there?
Where they were sighted was up near Bidwill and well away from any existing rail infrastructure.

Are they contemplating this as an alternative path through the area?

[Campbelltown busboy]

Rapid transit rail tech is really not a subject for discussion any longer. It has been well proven over many years now and is widely accepted as a best methodology for urban commuter rail.
. The perimeter circle - the City and NW line, the line from Tallawong to WSA, the link from WSA to Bankstown via Glenfield and Liverpool and the Bankstown line.
. The Macarthur line from WSA.

There is a issue with both of these lines
The Glenfield route would be a issue due to Qube container rail transfers in and out of the Minto container depot and the Pacific National run Boral cement train which for some reason doesn't get transferred onto the ARTC freight line south of Macarthur

Then there is the WSA to Macathur line which has the main south line to deal with on the Macarthur end of the line

[tonyp]

Has there been any discussion/debate on the path of the future metro connection between Tallawong and St Marys thus far?

Although there are likely plans within TfNSW, it's a matter of speculation for us. It's likely that the line will be on viaduct across the Eastern Ck floodplain - possibly most of the way from the metro depot to Richmond Rd. If it goes underground south of that, it could go any direction they choose.

[Glen]

This is old news so my apologies if it has been posted before.

Taken for a ride: The real cost of Sydney's metro railways

https://business-comms.sydney.edu.au/li ... /page.html

[moa999]

Another Dick Day piece.

[tonyp]

Another Dick Day piece.

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