While there are still a lot of unanswered questions about the funding for Auckland’s electric trains, the project to actually put up the wires is slowly chugging into action. Thanks to Andrew from the Silverstream blog, we have a scanned in flyer from KiwiRail providing more information on the progress of this critical project.
What is interesting, and slightly depressing, is that the phasing of electrifying the network was deliberately designed to make it possible to run electric trains to Eden Park for the Rugby World Cup. That was before everything got messed up in March this year, and really is proof that up until that point there really was a decent chance that we could have had electric trains for the World Cup. Now we’ll be lucky to have this project done by the end of 2013.
Moving away from that rather depressing note, it is good to see that the first parts of the project are not too far away from beginning (if we exclude the preparatory works for lowering tracks & raising bridges which has been going for quite a while now). Upgrades to the rail signalling system will be very welcome indeed – as often it is signalling problems which cause many of the delays on the Auckland rail network:
As I said above, some electrification-related work is already underway – such as raising bridges (where they need to be higher to fit the wires underneath them). There is also some work either underway, or due to get underway soon, to clear space where necessary at the sides of the tracks to prepare for the “real” construction work related to electrification. Once again, these are small steps – but good signs that this project is actually happening:
Hopefully once this project really kicks into action next year we will see regular updates on its progress from the agencies involved. It will be pretty cool seeing electrification roll out.
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Here something I’ve never thought of before: When they put up the masts do they leave room for future triple or quad tracking or do you need to pull down the masts and push them further out or even replace them..?
Good question that. A third track from Westfield to Wiri is going to beneeded pretty soon, so I am guessing KiwiRail would be careful about their future-proofing.
With the future triple tracking I would say there is no obvious side of the track that it would go on. Maybe the two existing tracks would have to be moved over in some places. The work would also seem to involve the demoltion of some of the stations along the route, as well as maybe even a road overbridge or two.
I don’t think Kiwirail will be encouraged to think about future-proofing under the current regime, and they certainly won’t have any more money to implement anything.
Surely stage 1 can’t be complete by 2011?
Here in Wellington each of the new overhead support poles for the new triple track into Wellington station has an outrigger support for the J’ville line overhead which is running parallel with the main line until they part company around the vicinity of the diesel depot. I don’t know if this sort of thing is practical for longer distances though I don’t see why not. Would a new track need to be electrified if it were predominately a freight line?
I am not sure exactly how a third-track would be put in – yes it would be a pretty big task. However, with the higher passenger frequencies in the future freight could get locked out.
2011 is quite possible, it doesn’t take too much to string up wires. Not like we will have any electric trains to run under them though.
The decisions they make here could effect future decisions about triple tracking and the SAL…
Jeremy H – good call! Ironically, the more money that has been put into rail in Auckland in recent years, the more damage they have done, through not thinking ahead enough.
I know that Ontrack/ARTA are not thinking of a 3rd track (cos I asked them about it 2 years ago in their station redesign process, and they were stunned, and claimed there was ‘no room’, which is false. I was asking them to plan for stations that allowed express passenger/freight 3rd/4th future lines. Sigh). Point is, it was not on their horizon (not even their 20 year plan).
For the record, the South line has nearly complete 3rd track space (and old track in large parts of it). This is mostly old sidings laid next to the current 2 track corridor at same grade. The 3rd track corridor runs on the West side of Newmarket-Westfield junction, and the East side of Westfield junction-Manurewa. There is also the old 3rd track from the base of Parnell rise to Newmarket through the old single track tunnel under the Domain, next to the current 2 track tunnel.
The formations/bridges/embankments are mostly in place, but would need tweaking. Link up the long sidings, and you have your 3rd track. Same as West track doubling – people forgot most of the West line had been doubled until 1970s, and formations, etc still existed.
Newer bridges are a problem, as Ontrack had no predecessor protecting the corridor since late 1980s, so many new bridges have been built to barely let 2 tracks through. But Luke – future proofing new bridges doesn’t cost a lot – the extra concrete & steel for an extra 3 metres width is no more than $1m or so. Bargain.
Many old bridges were built for the sidings that form the 3rd track corridor, so need no work. The real danger is these bridges get rebuilt during electrification (like Remuera Rd, Market Rd, Massey Rd, Jutland Rd, etc) as 2 track overbridges, requiring expensive bridge rebuilds when a 3rd track is needed.
So, it really comes down to pushing Ontrack and ARTA to be aware of what is there today. Far too many of them have no idea, and have never visited it. Perhaps they should do a Sunday jigger or DMU run along the existing South line from Britomart to Manurewa showing them the 3rd corridor?
For the record, here are the bridges that need rebuilding for a 3rd track between Strand (and Ports of Auckland for freight) and Manurewa on the South line, with nearest station in brackets:
Browns Rd (at Homai)
Bridge St (at Puhinui)
St Georges Rd (at Papatoetoe)
Ellerslie-Panmure highway (at Ellerslie) plus footbridge
Green Lane West (at Greenlane)
St Marks Rd (at Newmarket)
Parnell Rise viaduct (at Strand)
Strand viaduct (at Strand)
Ronayne St viaduct (at Strand)
Roughly $100m of bridge work, plus $250m of track/formation. But that’s cheap for a 3rd track. If we don’t block it now through bad planning.
Question – “much of the signaling system is old and life expired”?
This is weird – wasn’t the entire Auckland regional rail signals system rewired and placed in new conduit pipes just a few years ago? You can see the new galvanised signals pipes coming out of the ground and running along the walls of over bridges before going back underground past the bridge.
Anyone know how to reconcile this apparent contradiction?
And for the hat-trick:
Rebuilding Browns Rd bridge at Homai should be the first thing done for a 3rd track, so they can lay a 3rd track all the way from Manurewa old station (just North of the new platforms, and three 2 track overbridges) to Homai and Wiri and out to the new Manukau City Centre station.
Under 1,000 people live new Manukau City Centre – most workers and shoppers come from Manurewa, so this would give a fiscally viable shuttle run rail service, as it would be as fast and cheap as the current Gt South Rd buses.
Instead, the planners are working up a MCC-Britomart service via Puhinui; vastly expensive, puts more timeslot pressure on existing 2 tracks, and uses up more trainset time. 🙁
It really pisses me off when future proofing is done for motorway projects but not rail ones… For instance when you’re next driving along Auckland’s motorways keep in mind, “Are the overbridges wide enough to allow extra lanes”, you’ll notice than most have an enough room for an extra lane and shoulder on both sides…
Why has this been done for roads and not rail, to ensure future road projects are cheaper..? I think so…
Sadly Jeremy, the answer seems to be – because Ontrack don’t push hard enough for their track corridors. I know they care, but they are a recent agency (formed 2004 IIRC), and seem caught up in the huge backlog of upgrade work from 11 years privatisation (thanks Tranz Rail & Toll!). That makes it hard to keep focus on looking forward 5-20 years as well as on urgent track buckling rectification…
Newmarket station was a victim of this – prior to Ontrack’s creation, the Newmarket rail yards land was sold off to ppoperty developers, who then didn’t want to relinquish any land for wider rail platforms & track, nor for better bus interchange next to rail platforms. Can’t blame the developers (much) – the govt and rail companies (TR & Toll) wear the blame for that.
A supplementary question is – how do NZTA (formerly Transit) get away with claiming they will future proof motorway routes for rail, then not doing so? SH20 Mt Roskill extension (finished) was supposed to have Southdown-Avondale railway formation works done as part of the motorway earthworks. Don’t see any sign of that ;(
Ditto SH20 Mangre Bridge duplication. NZTA rebuilt the Hastie Ave footbridge over SH20, and Mahunga Dr road bridge, and neither left space for the Airport rail line tracks to be laid. Which means they have to be rebuilt as part of any such rail project, massively inflating the rail project cost (and giving more road works to the contractors).
It’s a sneaky way of blocking the projects of a competing transport mode.
The only one where NZTA have done the track formation work as part of the motorway build is the Manukau City spur rail line (as part of SH20-SH1 motorway link-up). But this was carefully watched and pushed (and part funded) by Manukau City Council.
They have built the overbridges with space for the rail corridor on the SH20 Mt Roskill extension but the lack of vision and future proofing is astounding and pathetic…
I can’t blame Transit/NZTA for the Airport rail stuff ups as readily as failures on existing corridors simply because their is no designation or obvious designation out to the Airport…
It’s like the debacle with the new Mangere bridge, people were saying “why can’t you make the new bridge take rail?” and transit’s reply was that they were there to build a road (as is their job), that airport rail wasn’t on ARTA or anyone elses plan or agenda, and no one had offered any funding for the additonal works.
Hopefully with this new LTS things like airport rail, the SAL and an eastern busway will be firmly on the agenda and therefore more likely to be considered as part of any new project.
Reason number 5263486 why Ontrack should be merged with NZTA and not Kiwirail.
Aaaah, Nick R, there is the point, eh? If ARC and ARTA had been more assertive and drafted long-term intentions (even if unfunded) onto their 10 and 20 year plans, then they can say ‘look at how much unfunded rail work there is – stingy govt’. Transit learnt that trick long ago (and Michael Barnett of Akld Chamber of Commerce used it soooo effectively against Cullen to ‘complete the motorway network’).
Dunno if merging Ontrack with NZTA would be positive Jarbury – the rail gurus may get swamped by the roadhogs…
Jeremy – there is width by SH20 Mt Roskill shoulders for expansion, but surely that is motorway expansion, not rail? Reason: rail corridors need to run slightly further away from motorways at overbridges, so they only need to tunnel under the cross road, not both onramp, crossroad, and offramp.
Nick – NZTA deliberately made the new SH20 Mangere Bridge a high level so they could ‘join’ the two bridges, but it had the convenient side effect of ‘being unviable’ for heavy rail. A low level alternative -which would have allowed rail – was rubbished by NZTA for no good reason.
Also, there is a corridor for rail to Akld Airport, but the vacant land is somewhat obscured by bushes – it runs:
* low level rail bridge from Onehunga rail line across Manukau harbour to Mangere Bridge station (by Miro Rd marae)
* along east side of SH20 to Hastie Ave, staying at Miro Rd level while SH20 rises to peak at Hastie Ave. Rail cut n covers under SH20 to west side at Hastie Ave area
* along west side of SH20 then curving to run along north side of SH20A to Kirkbride Rd (station at Walmsley Rd, Mangere Town Centre – Bader Dr).
* cross Kirkbride Rd at grade (requires road overbridge, which should span rail and SH20A – extending the motorway!) along north of George Bolt Memorial Dr (SH20A) to Ihumatao Rd just outside Airport precinct (with Ihumatao station after Kirkbride Rd serving new industrial area and west Mangere).
* curving slightly west to loop around Tom Pearce Dr (avoiding all roads and carparks) to run straight along international terminal entrance and then straight along domestic terminal entrance (with single long station straddling the two terminals – get off at one end for domestic, other end for international).
* rail terminates at domestic terminal, but is aiming to cross Pukaki Creek and run through farm land to join NIMT at Wiri (and run straight into Wiri-Manukau City spur line being built, making that viable).
Whew! Sorry for the detail, but just wanted to make clear there is a potential rail corridor there, so long as ARTA (currently studying such things) don’t duff it up with an expensive blunder. I have low confidence in their talent pool 😉
The great thing about an Airport rail line is every station you open (building in small stages) opens up new patronage (55,000 people in Mangere), and improves viability of Onehunga Rail.
6 bridges/tunnels and 1 level crossing required:
* Manukau harbour overbridge
* Mahunga Dr underbridge (pity NZTA didn’t allow for it in their just finished rebuild)
* Hastie Ave tunnel to cross sides of SH20 (ditto re: NZTA)
* Tararata Creek (large culvert) overbridge
* Walmsley Rd underbridge (west of onramp; requires Coronation Rd onramp to be replaced by Walmsley Rd onramp, which is more standard anyway)
* Kirkbride Rd underbridge
* Montgomerie Rd underbridge
* Ihumatao Rd (resident only traffic) level crossing, west of junction with George Bolt Memorial Dr to avoid junction issues.
Doesn’t sound too expensive, aye?
Bob, Hastie Ave footbridge had to be extended because of the motorway length, however they didn’t extend it past where the rail line would be extended as this part would be rebuilt to include a station, so even if it was built with the extra width it would be torn down again, interesting to note that the whole bridge wouldn’t be needed to be torn down but just the ramp it’self, which would most likely be replaced with a lift and stairs instead.
The RLTS has an Airport Rail designation as a priority, hopefully this gets done… Whew another thing to campaign for…
@Bob, the Mt Roskill SH20 motorway overbridges have TWO supports underneath them with one inbetween the westbound and eastbound lanes with room for lane expansion, the second support will be between the eastbound lane and the SAL (except as it passes through the Keith Hay Park area, not sure what’ll happen here as she’s pretty narrow)…
Bob, I’m almost 100% certain the design of the new Mangere Bridge was eventually amended to allow for a low level rail deck to be tacked on to one side of the foundations, so all is not lost!
Yeah the Campaign for Better Transport took NZTA to the environment court to ensure that the design of the Mangere Bridge was done in a way that made it easy for rail to be put across there in the future.
I think I’ve asked this before, as a single or double track..?
Sweet Jesus it would have to double track, right?!
Yes it would absolutely have to be double-track. There’s no point spending hundreds of millions on building the line unless you’re going to run trains at 15 minute frequencies along it. And those frequencies mean that double-tracking is definitely necessary.
You couldn’t have double track through Onehunga and to the Airport, i.e. only section of single track was over the bridge..?
Does anyone know the definitive answer..?
I suppose that’s possible. However, I think that there would be a great unwillingness to actually build a section of single-track (beyond a stub like Onehunga) when we have spent hundreds of millions double-tracking the Western Line.
The mangere bridge definately has been designed to carry rail across it. Their has also be careful allocation of a rail corrador throughout the projects length. I however don’t know if they have catered for just one or two lines.