Matt’s post the other day about the City Rail Link (CRL) project highlighted a growing feeling that proponents of the project (in particular Auckland Council and Auckland Transport) need to keep pushing the message of why this project is needed, as well as (certainly in my opinion) keep the public abreast of what progress is being made. Aside from a pretty logo and some incredibly generic factsheets on the project, we pretty much haven’t heard anything about what’s going on behind the scenes since the middle of last year.
Given the history of delays (Onehunga Station, Manukau Station, integrated ticketing etc.) to public transport projects, whenever things go quiet there’s always a sneaking worry that it’ll just drop off the radar never to be heard from again. While that does seem unlikely for this particular project, especially as it’s supposedly the number one transport priority project in the Auckland Plan, given the aforementioned history, one can’t be too careful.
The reason why all of this is important is not just so nosey bloggers can keep up with the play, but also because public support for the CRL is critical in ensuring that it goes ahead. While most of us are resigned to the fact that the current government will never fund the project, no matter how fantastic its revised business case is, there may be a change in government by 2014 – still time to push the “go” button and have the CRL completed by 2021: which has always been the target completion date. However, there are a few huge assumptions in that timeline:
- That there will be a change of government (or that, miraculously, the current government might change its opinion of the project)
- That the next government would be inclined to stump up significant funding for the project
- That we still have a Council which supports the CRL after next year’s elections
In terms of public support for the project, this most strongly relates to the third assumption. It would be tragically ironic if, in 2014, we find ourselves with a central government willing to help fund the CRL, but a Council that no longer wants it.
So, with all that lengthy preamble, it is clearly important to “market” the project’s benefits over the next year or so in particular. There will be certain events over that time which should help market the project, such as the consenting process – which will show real progress and provide a lot more information (such as pretty pictures of the stations), although obviously also have risks as the negative environmental effects of the CRL are highlighted (although as it’s pretty much all in a tunnel, these shouldn’t be too massive). But there’s still going to be a need, especially as the issue of how we actually pay for the CRL comes into greater focus, to keep explaining, highlighting and describing why this project is necessary. This is my initial crack at that task.
Essentially, I think the City Rail Link project is all about adding capacity to Auckland’s transport network. This network, comprising of both roads and rail, is obviously of a certain size and has a certain amount of capacity. With regard to the CRL, capacity is often discussed in terms of just the city centre, but that falls into the trap which I think leads to a lot of the opposition to the project: that it’s just about the city centre. I disagree, it’s about the whole region. Although traffic growth on the roading part of Auckland’s transport network has tailed off in recent years, with the city’s population expected to increase from 1.5 million now to 2.5 million in 30 years, clearly (even with a decline in per capita travel) there will be more transport demand in 30 years time than there is now.
So, over the next 30 years we find ourselves in the situation of having a fairly significant jump in transport demand (with recent trends highlighting that most of the increase is on public transport). The key question becomes “what’s the best way to handle that increase?” This is clearly a question that requires a complicated answer, and in fact whole transport plans and strategies to answer it fully – with some of the solution being a management of demand (through encouraging more off-peak travel so we can use the current network more efficiently), some being selective improvements to the roading network where that makes sense and is necessary, much of it being through having a better bus network… and, most critically in terms of the CRL, ensuring that we are able to optimally use all of the transport network we currently have.
As it’s such a key issue, I will elaborate on the last sentence in the paragraph above to highlight what I mean by it. The current rail network obviously forms a part of the existing transport system – but it’s a part of the transport system which is vastly under-utilised in terms of its ultimate capacity. As the graphic below highlights (from here), heavy rail (our system is a kind of hybrid between commuter and heavy rail, although one could argue forever about where you draw the line between many of the different technologies) has the potential for simply enormous people-moving capacity:
While the theoretical capacity of our rail system is extremely high, we are – of course – limited by the current design of the rail network as capacity is only ever as large as the weakest point on the network. And the weakest point of our network is the bottleneck of the Britomart train station. This limits the capacity of each main line (western, southern and eastern) to six trains per hour and Onehunga to two trains per hour. A six-car electric train is likely to be able to carry around 750 people, meaning that the “person capacity” of the rail network is limited to 4500 people each way per hour, which I’ve added to our diagram as a red line:
To use a roading analogy, our current system is like having a ten lane motorway disgorging onto a single lane-dirt track. It’s pretty dumb, not just because of the congestion we create, but perhaps most importantly, because we’re wasting a huge amount of the investment we made in that motorway. Similarly for Auckland’s rail network, we will only ever unlock the real benefits of Project DART and electrification once the “dirt track” capacity bottleneck of Britomart is resolved through constructing the CRL.
But, I hear you say, we aren’t actually near carrying 4,500 people per direction per hour yet on our rail system, so the Britomart bottleneck is not a huge issue yet. Part of the answer to this question is that our current rolling stock limits us to much less than this number (causing any of the existing overcrowding on the rail network), and the electric trains will significantly add to the ‘people capacity’ of the rail network. The other answer to the question is that we’ve compensated for the lack of capacity in the rail system by running a hugely expensive duplicative bus network. By starting to remove much of that duplication, we’re able to operate a fantastically better bus network – focusing buses on becoming feeders (thereby expanding the reach of the rail network) and providing massively enhanced all-day frequency. This was illustrated at last month’s Transport Committee meeting: 
Every route shown above runs at 15 minute frequencies, all day, ever day. This network is only possible by reallocating resources away from bus routes that duplicate rail.
The other capacity matter that needs pointing out is in terms of roading. While the current ‘flat lining’ of traffic raises huge questions around whether we need to expand the road network at all, even if we did, this is becoming increasingly difficult. Not only are roading projects becoming more and more expensive (Victoria Park Tunnel and Waterview Connection requiring tunnels), but inevitably, because there is not the huge latent capacity available on our road network as there is on the rail network, each roading project just shifts the problem up or down the motorway. For example, my observation has been that opening the Victoria Park Tunnel’s third lane is clogging up the harbour bridge more than expected, basically replacing a traffic jam south of Wellington Street with one north of Fanshawe Street.
So if our population is growing by a million over 30 years, we can’t easily and cheaply expand the roading network (plus every time we do, it just shifts the problem rather than fixing it), while we have a piece of infrastructure (the rail network) hugely under-utilised because of a capacity constraint (Britomart), fixing that capacity constraint surely become a no-brainer.
Of course that’s not the CRL’s only benefit, we can add improved access to the city centre through the new stations, vastly quicker travel times for those heading to the city from the west, a kind of ephemeral “world-class city” benefit, agglomeration benefits from more employment in the city centre, higher rail frequencies throughout the network, easier cross-town access by allowing trains to through-route and so forth. But ultimately, I think the CRL is needed because there is simply no cheaper and easier way to increase the capacity of Auckland’s transport system so dramatically. And everyone, no matter where you live, work or play, benefits from Auckland’s transport system having significantly more capacity.
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[The reason why all of this is important is not just so nosey bloggers can keep up with the play, but also because public support for the CRL is critical in ensuring that it goes ahead. While most of us are resigned to the fact that the current government will never fund the project, no matter how fantastic its revised business case is, there may be a change in government by 2014 – still time to push the “go” button and have the CRL completed by 2021: which has always been the target completion date. However, there are a few huge assumptions in that timeline]
And there is the entire argument summed up in a nutshell.
Basically where Council has failed – the little people need to step up to the plate and “take-over” – or another way of putting it “If you want it done right then do it yourself!” 😛
What I am getting at is can you Peter (and Matt and Patrick) some up your Marketing CRL posts to 900 words each, collate them and pester the Herald big time to try and run either a Dialogue printing or even a mini-series. Pressure from those concerned ending up in the Herald could spur Council back into action before the LTP derails things in June.
This needs to be put back in the spot light and rather fast – I was not particularly amused that Dog Registrations can get 4000 submissions and the CRL bugger all and a scant remark out of Stuff.co.nz Although I did have a happy moment Council Finances and Debt did get a mention with yours truly getting a quote put in Tuesday’s Herald 😀 – a shame though it wasnt the CRL which I did hammer on at Length though on Monday at the LTP forum AND got the entire table of 12 made up of all sorts to agree (when only two of us at that table plus Councillor Wood knew what the CRL was and how it worked) 😀
Blowing ones trumpet aside for a moment
Please do accept my apologies however if I appear what is the word I am looking for here – I will think of it later – not enough coffees yet 😛 but myself and some of my work colleagues are coming to the conclusion that AKL is coming close to a whisker of losing the CRL regardless of Len stumps up with Chinese Money to bankroll the entire operation.
Time to sell the CRL benefits to the public and turn the 2 out of 12 knowing into 12/12 knowing 🙂
It’s about selling the project to the public and framing it in a way they understand. I’d suggest comparing it to the importance of the CMJ in the motorway network, given they have both a similar function in connecting the whole network and allowing smooth flows of people across the region.
That’s not a bad analogy, actually. Compare the completed CMJ with the old situation of having to travel between Northern and North-Western by way of the CBD and it’s quite similar to the limitation imposed by Britomart: without the direct N-NW link, the through capacity of both was limited to the volume of traffic that could traverse suburban streets. With Britomart, the feeding train lines have massive capacity that is limited by how fast trains can be turned around and sent back out over a shared line.
Well thats the thing. People understand that you can travel through the CMJ without getting off it to the CBD and its location is just part of its wider regional function. Its thes same with the CRL – you might travel through/beside the CBD but your ultimate destination is further afield if we end up with one of the rail networks proposed on here.
What an excellent post. You have certainly covered all the aspects about getting the message across regarding the CRL. My only misgiving is that the explanation is still much too long for mainstream media to take it up (hopefully with acknowldgement). One can only hope that perhaps Mr.Mayor will read it then take it up and disseminate the reasoning you have expressed so well. I loved the analogy of the motorway emptying into a dirt track!
I’d like to see a video like waterview tunnel but with the number of people each train could carry hovering above each train as it moves around the network. Before and after.
That’s a great well-explained piece.
Do we need to abstract away from individual projects, and ask a more generic question about what we want our transit network to achieve and what can we afford (where the CRL becomes a project to achieve this target). Which will hopefully put the focus on the future transit network arrangement (which if we look historically at the 50yr motorway building program) we are going to spend significant amounts on. This blog has done a fantastic job detailing the future RTN.
By costing various transit (all modes) network solutions, and estimating their performance, we can develop a cost-performance curve, from which a preferred performance target can be justified i.e. what we want our transit network to achieve and what can we afford.
This performance target is funded by the council / government, how this performance target is achieved is up to the council transport planners e.g. the specific projects and timing of these projects.
For example what are some of transit network performance target variables we might want to achieve.
For the PT network:
– x% of residents can expect to reach their destination within x number of transfers
– x% of residents will be within x distance of a PT stop
– local network will provide an average speed of x km/hr between the hours of x am to x pm
– QTN will provide an average speed of x km/hr
– RTN will provide an average speed of x km/hr
For the road network it might be something like:
– Motorways will provide an average speed of x km/hr during the peak
– Arterial roads will provide an average speed of x km/hr during the peak
– Local roads will provide an average speed of x km/hr during the peak
The above performance targets are one variable, the other will be the cost associated with achieving a target.
So what performance can we afford to achieve and by what time frame?
That would also need to be qualified regarding distance between start and end point stations. I could contrive a realistic journey that would require at least five transfers: local bus to feeder bus, feeder bus to arterial RTN, RTN transfer between arterials, arterial RTN to feeder bus, feeder bus to local bus.
In theory the network designs proposed in here that hub through Aotea should put the entirety of the arterial RTN within three transfers from entry to exit.
“To use a roading analogy, our current system is like having a ten lane motorway disgorging onto a single lane-dirt track”
Wasn’t that the analogy, more or less, they used for Puhoi To Wellsford?
Not claiming it isn’t much more apt here, mind.
While I get your thinking, it’s far too long-winded for a general audience. The writing style needs to be more like Julie Genter’s on Kiwiblog.
Good newspaper articles need good graphics, some of which can be done by in-house graphic artists at the newspaper. Since the detractors think in terms of motorways, the graphic should be based on the number of motorway lane equivalents. The Brittomart entry tunnel is equivalent to 6 lanes each way (750 passengers per train x 18 trains per hour divided by [2000 vehicles per hour per motorway lane x 1.2 people per vehicle]). This limits the western, southern and eastern lines to only 2 lane-equivalents each, even though their tracks could carry 6 lane-equivalents each way.
The comments on Kiwiblog from Julie’s article are enlightening about the arguments put up by detractors, eg
1. The small proportion of Auckland employment in the CBD and many already travel by bus. These statistics ignore the uni students, the “inner city” (such as Newmarket), and planned development such as Wynyard quarter. Including these would probably bring the central city commute up to ~25%.
2. Buses are more cost-effective than trains. The high operating costs of buses on trunk routes and in congested city areas needs to be pointed out.
Excellent blog. Nice to see an article that isn’t trying to bait anyone who supports National. I really think that the tone of this article is the way forward. We should stop referring to “the holiday highway” or equating National = motorways, Labour/Greens = rail. If we politisize the debate a lot of potential support is alienated. What Peter says about rail being part of the total transport network is entirely correct and I believe is the best way to discuss it. It’s not rail versus roads, it’s making Auckland a better place to live.
Yes Brian I think that’s true except as far as funding goes it is roads versus PT. And far as policy goes it is National versus the rest. I don’t give a damn what the colour of the rosette is on the chest of the politicians that make this and other smarter transport investments happen but when the party in charge claims that there is no money for rational policy because it’s own irrational one is using it all what can you do?
National are the only force that can de-politicise this issue by supporting the clearly expressed wishes of the region and its Council to some meaningful degree. Did you read the comments to Genter’s guest post on Kiwiwblog? Many there just attacked their own characterisation of the Green Party, no attempt to engage with her argument at all.
National could completely mess with the opposition parties by listening to their own polls and choosing to support this project, perhaps they even will before the next election [if they’re smart, and/or desparate] but that would take a huge change in rhetoric from their current stance. I thought that Joyce was starting to leave the door ajar for this with some of his later statements about the CRL but blunderbus Brownlee has subsequently gone typically infantile on the issue in a way that would make it very hard to be at all reasonable about it.
Patrick, I don’t disagree with your comments regarding the governments and individual ministers actions. My point is that even if you feel justified in referring to Brownlee as a blunderbuss, just by doing that you will alienate some support. You must be careful what you write about others, even if it appears humorous to yourself and your colleagues. We are trying to win a war here, not point score a couple of name calling victories. I remember in the 70’s the opposition parties used to always refer to Muldoon as piggy. It stopped overnight when it was estimated that 5% of Nationals support came from voters who felt sorry for Muldoon. Do you really want to throw away 5% support by name calling Brownlee?
Yeah OK, although bluderbuss is not a nickname, nor an attempt at humour, but an accurate description of his actions, but I take your point.
I still struggle to find meaningful data on the CRL. I thought it made basic sense – but when I wanted to find out more, I only found either high level “motherhood and applie pie” stuff, or AT/Council reports about minutes saved, but nothing on passenger number.
I found Govt review, which did have numbers. And was somewhat shocked to see my Western line won’t benefit as capacity is fully taken at 4720 in 2 years after electrification, and CRL doesn’t help as capacity constraint is between Morningside and Newmarket, with only half the 4720 going on into CBD. These “facts” seemed to have been agreed with Council/AT and ministries. So saving x minutes into CBD seemes pointless when you can’t get on until after Newmarket!
So where is a basic table of what these “capacity” increases are? I think as a project it will struggle until someone can do the very logical powerpoint slide summary – with meaningful data not the minutes saved.
After seeing the Western line figures – I started to wonder if the Mt Albert/Onehunga/Southdown might not be a bigger priority? connects more work places – and obviously a large number getting off Western at Newmarket heading south in am peak already.
Mark. Somewhat puzzled by your questions there, once the CRL is built Western Line travelers won’t be going to the CBD via Newmarket. The CRL will remove the Britomart capacity constraint and as demand grows more trains can be added. Until there is an agreed running pattern it isn’t clear what the initial frequency on the Western Line will be but we can reasonably expect it to be responsive to demand.
Trains at 5 min freqs carrying 750 pax means some 9000 passengers per hour. That should do for a while….
Until the CRL is built there are indeed likely to be problems getting on trains, because of both a lack of rolling stock until the EMUs are all running and the Britomart constraint, but that is hardly a reason to oppose the one thing that will fix this problem for quite a while; the CRL.
The MoT and gov basically doesn’t believe people want to use trains so is an unreliable source of predictions of both uptake and likely service volumes.
By the way I wouldn’t trust the numbers on the MOTs review, they made some huge and glaring mistakes in it. Things like they assumed there was unlimited capacity on the roads to handle additional vehicles, that the price of parking in 30 years will be the same as it is now and failed to account for things like that most trains would run as two EMUs which is important from an operational cost perspective.
As for capacity, I was already in the process of putting together a post with a graph showing that.
Patrick – I realise Western line can go via CRL – but 50% of Western line users alight between Grafton and Newmarket, and leave 2000 carrying on to CBD. This will be due to hospital/schools at grafton and Newmarket as both a destination and switch to southern. And capacity hits 100% between morningside and kingsland. So no extra people can get on and get to the CBD. But also then what happens to grafton/newmarket people? does every second train go to CBD and other to Newmarket? which drops the frequencies too much.
Not sure about 5min frequencies you mention? max on western per AT/Govt was 10 min after new emu/electrification. Constraints as far as I could tell were switching / dwell times at stations / length of trains / and corridor length
This was where I saw the western line figures:
http://www.transport.govt.nz/ourwork/rail/aucklandcbdraillink/
there was a very interesting bit about the new parnell station slowing Britomart turnaround time from 4 to 6 minutes, and reducing capacity. I know Joel Cayford was questioning this station.
Mark, capacity is determined by infrastructure and the number of trains you run. The key about the CRL is that you can run way way more trains on the western line without hitting capacity constraints from infrastructure.
Post electrification the limit is still 6 tph so 4500 people per hour. Post CRL the capacity could be 24-30 trains per hour so between 18,000 and 23,000 people. That’s a 4-5 fold increase.
One thing to consider is people may tend to use Grafton and Newmarket heavily from the west because it is nice and direct, you can only get to Britomart from the west via a fairly length detour around the east side of town and through Parnell.
If the CRL is built it may still be roughly the same numbers split between Britomart and Grafton-Newmarket, but you have hugely more people going to Newton, K Rd and Aotea as well. The split will probably end up something like 80% going to CRL stations, and 20% going to the Parnell/Newmarket/Grafton side. In that case it makes sense to send all the western trains to the CRL first then back around to Newmaket.
Peter – please back up a 2min train frequency!!
There are basic, almost leagl switching rules, and the basic rules of how you run a network, with consistent frequency. that will be what gives a 10 min max on western line. When running a network, all constraints come into play. that was why Beccas could so easily rule out the Queen St to western line light rails option (1A). It just didn’t physically work. It takes a miniumum amount of time to slow/stop and loas/unload at a station, then followed by a saftey margin to next train. That is then impacted by any longer speed strecthes eg New Lynn to Henderson – where trains will bunch up behind stopped trains. A rail network operates as a whole line/network – it’s not like a bus lane, where you have express buses passing slower ones, or you bring on new buses part way along for inner city peak stations.
Nick R – yes I suspect all will have to go to Britomart, but then that’s a longer/slower trip for the current 50%, with no surveys/figures of who will get off at K rd etc. The 3 CRL stations are all very low employment based stations for any peak traffic, whereas grafton ha sthe hospital/school and Newmarket – all proven destinations.
Mark you really think it won’t be possible to better 10 min freqs with the CRL? You’re kidding right? Are we really buying such crap kit? I for one, am sure that there will still be direct west to south services, whether its 80/20 like Nick says or something different his point is important; the CRL changes everything and basing expectations on current patterns is a big mistake. Please note Nick is not saying that everything will have to go to through Britomart from out west.
10min frequency is what will be run post electrification (and can be now) but that is considered the maximum due to having to work in with the other lines. You could run more trains out west but they would just hit a log jam getting into Newmarket/Britomart due to there being no slots available. The basic version of the signalling system allows for 15 trains per hour per direction or 4 minute frequencies, some sections like Newmarket to Britomart have been designed to have higher capacity and can see 20+ trains per hour per direction.
As for Grafton and Newmarket, my experience as a user who catches trains every day is that it is probably more like 40% using those stations
Four minute headways are pretty lazy, three minutes are standard in most places. Two minutes not uncommon while on busier metros they run 90 seconds or sometimes faster.My understanding was the new signalling signal is designed to operate up to three minute headways.
Mark, the central part of the CBD around Aotea has massive employment catchment, massive residential catchment, a huge concentration of retailing, restaurants, theatres and other attractions, it has the seat of local government, the city library and the art gallery not to mention two universities. There is no point in the country that has more stuff around it than the site of Aotea station, and it is going to be incredibly busy. I wouldn’t be surprised if Aotea alone saw more passengers than all the other central area stations put together.
2 minutes is definitely possible, because it’s done overseas. It’ll require a lot of things to happen to upgrade the network switching (the signalling is already capable of handling two minute frequencies, I believe, or can be made to do so), but it’s definitely doable.
The differing distances between stations is irrelevant because your dwell time should always be the same at each station.
Train 1 departs Station A at 00:00, arrives at Station B at 02:00, dwells for 30 seconds, leaves at 02:30, arrives at Station C at 05:00, leaves at 05:30, arrives at Station D at 07:00, departs at 07:30.
Train 2 arrives at Station A at 02:00, dwells for 30 seconds, leaves at 02:30, arrives at Station B at 04:30 (with Train 1 two minutes ahead), leaves at 05:00, arrives at Station C at 07:30, departs at 08:00, arrives at Station D at 09:30.
See how it works? Provided you have the same dwell time at every station, and it’s enforced, it doesn’t matter if you have the same distance between stations because the trains are always arriving 2:30 ahead of the next train and only dwell for 30 seconds. The key is rigid adherence to dwell times, and it will take years before there’s sufficient commuter experience for that to be workable. However, it’ll also take years before two minute frequencies are justified except for a very small section of the network and by that point the wider network will be running to much tighter timetables with the same short, enforced dwell times. One of the biggest impacts on on-time running right now is the dwell time variability across the network, with the moronic Newmarket design the major culprit but the problem existing at all stations on all lines.
Matt L – thanks for backing up the 10 min. I understand the possible max re switching, but thought the different distances bettwen stations eg short Morningside to Kingsland vs long distances New Lynn to Nderson impacted as well? ie different parts going fast and then slow. That then leads to bunching up, and you can’t get a standard time interval – hence the 10 min works even with the CRL when they’re not joining southern line.
Your 40% also matches the AT/govt figures 4720 max with 2000 on to CBD. I still struggle to see how it will work.
Do you have a view on Western to Onehunga as a priority?
I’m not aware of station distance affecting things, the signalling from Newmarket to Morningside can handle 20 trains per hour per direction (tphpd) and the AT business case suggests that it would be possible to have 30tphpd and that is with the CRL stations being some of the closest on the network.
As for West to South, I don’t think it is as big as some people claim. I used to do it regularly and there were never that many (although that was during the Newmarket upgrade when the two stations were miles apart). My observation from the trains I catch is that perhaps one or two dozen max are doing that transfer at the moment which isn’t much out of a train with 300-400 people on it.
The other thing that will help is that the EMUs will all accelerate and brake with roughly the same performance profile, and be able to reach top speed on even the shortest sections of line. The current mish-mash of ancient trains and freight locomotives makes real time-keeping impossible because they all accelerate and brake differently, and none of them perform terribly well. We could never run much tighter than we do now without putting speed restrictions across the entire fleet to cap performance at the capability of the worst-performing units in service.
Mark are you still mixing up pre-CRL with post-CRL? 10 mins is pre-CRL, 4 mins is post.
Mark is right in pointing out that in order to actually achieve these levels of frequency additional infrastructure is likely to be needed – in particular the grade separation of pretty much every level crossing on the network. This is not only because the roads will become increasingly impassable, but also because signalling sections are affected by level crossings and if we are to run so many trains we will need to have our signals optimised in a way that’s just not possible with level crossings.
But that’s OK because we’re not planning on running that many trains for quite so time yet. The point remains that CRL gets rid of the primary bottleneck and constraint in the network to running vastly higher train frequencies – in effect a kind of Metro.
The money for this CRL is coming from the greater Auckland area there is a need to be clear on the benefits of the whole province.
1. Freight: Auckland port to transport hubs Southdown, Wiri. today Trucks / trains moving between these places are limited to off peak hours, let say 10:00am? too 2:00pm? and 7:00pm? overnight 7:00am?
2. Sprint Passenger service: 80km/h
We know there are people in Palmerston north and Masterton that are commuting 2 1/2 hours each morning and evening. Lets say Mr W lives in Whangarei and works in Manukau 2 1/2 hour drive off peak 8:00pm? overnight to 6:00am?. Mr T lives in Tauranga and works in Manukau 2 1/2 hour drive off peak 10:00am? too 2:00pm? and 7:00pm? overnight to 7:00am?
Question: will there hours of work become more flexible after the CRL is built and by how much.
3. Stop service: Well manage sprawl along a existing supply line like a State Highway from Whangarei Too Tauranga benefits the people at the centre the most. Each new subdivision along this supply line justifies an increases of Service from it ends.
Matt – my understanding is that while dwell times can be std – it’s the distance and speeds between stations that then impacts. That to hit a std frequency ie every 10 min a train hits a station, then you have to slow some parts. With a long distance the speed increases, but with a short distance speed isn’t as fast – so on western line max speed that can give frequency is the pick up speed (slow) out of Morningside (dependent on signal/road closure as well), then max speed to Kingalsn allowing a slow down and stop/dwell – and that that speed/dwell gives the max for the line. ie there’s no point in running fast on a long stretch like Henderson to New Lynn, as you then gate trains bunching up as they hit slower part of the network.
Someone else may be able to explain better but if all trains are doing the same stopping pattern then it wouldn’t matter how fast they were going on the some parts of the network compared to others.
Here is the maximum capacity of the network from a train movement perspective
So Papakura-Westfield really looks like more of an issue as it services both the Eastern and Southern line commuter trains and freight. Aren’t there plans for addition track works here?
That’s not the case Mark, railways are a serial system. With the same stopping pattern all the trains end up going fast on the fast bits, slow on the slow bits and stopped at the stations. What you might be missing in your understanding is the fact that signal blocks aren’t just between stations or a fixed distance, but they are spaced at regular intervals to give a fairly regular time in each block. So distance and speed between stations aren’t a factor, its distance and speed between signal blocks.
Think of it this way, if the system is designed for three minute headways, then the signal blocks are set up so that a train can clear a block in less than three minutes. If every block can be cleared in less than three minutes, including blocks at stations, then you can run a train every three minutes all along the line. They would all move from block to block sequentially every three minutes. The key thing is the signal blocks can be longer or shorter depending on how much time it takes a train to traverse that section.
As a quick aside, this isn’t the case when you are planning to run express trains that don’t stop at every station, but we’ll have few if any of those under the mature system.
“which I think leads to a lot of the opposition to the project: that it’s just about the city centre. I disagree, it’s about the whole region.”
No, it really is all about the city centre. Britomart is on a spur from the rest of the network. Train frequencies could be increased substantially if they did not all have to be routed via Britomart but bypassed it with a simple, low cost connection at Beach Road just like in the old days. “But trains MUST go to Britomart because it serves the CBD” is the chorus I have heard. Fair point (the Beach Road connection therefore becomes a hypothetical construct to test the hypothesis that “it’s about the whole region”). It follows, however, that since the CRL will remove the Britomart constraint it really is primarily about increasing capacity for the CBD rather then the rest of the network. The rest of the network would be able to support much greater train frequencies absent the implicit requirement to serve the CBD and it becomes the Westfield-Papakura section that becomes the bottleneck.
Without the CRL, no Western-Eastern direct services are possible. That’s a network limitation directly imposed by the design of the network centring on Britomart, and quite a big one.
The CBD is the biggest single employment centre in Auckland and that’s without accounting for all the students, so it will always be the primary destination for public transport. The second-biggest centre is the airport and surrounds, and without the CRL it’s basically impossible to add peak-time services that run to Britomart from any other part of the network. Running services that don’t go to the CBD when most passengers are headed there is a loser if it’s meant to be a permanent solution to a dead-end station feeding the principal destination on the entire network. It could take some pressure off it it’s used temporarily, but it’s just not going to work long-term.
I’ll take that as a QED then, shall I?
First line, ya twit. And benefits in moving people to/from the CBD are still benefits to the region in terms of easier movement for people/freight travelling through the CMJ.
Resorting to name calling is a particularly poor substitute for reasoned debate and, in the context of winning unbelievers over to the one true faith of the CRL, an appalling own goal. Please try and post in a more mature manner.
The business case for the CRL made it clear that the cost cannot be justified by the benefits given the current level of demand. It requires a significant growth in the CBD for the benefits to outweigh the cost. As an investment decision it really IS all about the CBD and the inherent strategy to concentrate growth there. Nobody is arguing for the bulk of services to bypass the CBD…nobody. As has been pointed out, there isn’t the demand for such services since there is more than sufficient capacity for non-CBD services. That speaks volumes.
Read the business case and you may be surprised to note than once the CRL-generated growth in the CBD has reached the point where the benefits exceed the cost of the CRL the CMJ will be carrying more traffic than it does at present. Qui bene?
You may also be surprised to find that it IS possible to run direct East-West services without the CRL.
Pretty much every transport project out there is dependent on future growth in patronage/traffic to help justify its existence. This is why the lack of increase in traffic numbers raises some particularly interesting questions around many of the roading projects that are currently being funded by the government.
Of course the CRL is not justified by the current level of rail patronage. That’s why we’re not opening it tomorrow. However, rail patronage is increasing (last month excepted) steadily, unlike traffic growth.
Furthermore, I think you’re getting a bit mixed up about CBD growth and the CRL and are missing the point of what most people are saying. One big reason to build the CRL is to boost employment in the CBD, so it’s not that the CRL relies on that employment increase for it to make sense, it’s that the CRL is expected (backed up by complex modelling and overseas experience) to boost CBD employment.
Finally, I don’t think anyone is saying that the CBD won’t benefit from the CRL or disputes that the business case for the CRL relates to the future of the CBD. What we’re saying is that the CRL has significant benefits for all of Auckland – not just the CBD. Those benefits arise from unlocking the capacity of the whole rail network (allowing more frequency trains etc.) and from being able to leverage off that enhanced rail network to operate a much better and more efficient bus network throughout the whole of Auckland. While it’s not the panacea for all of Auckland’s transport woes, it is the key to pretty much any major improvement to Auckland’s PT network – enabling us to become less car dependent and have a better balanced transport system.
Not mixed up Peter. “CRL-generated” acknowledges that the CRL will stimulate employment in the CBD (very significantly, according to the business case). Unless there is a very large increase in employment in Auckland its population will not increase by 1 million and the very basis of your case for more transport capacity becomes moot. The CRL will benefit other areas of Auckland (but not all as you erroneously claim) however unless these benefits are compared to the cost it is naive to expect unqualified support from the populace at large. The CRL as an investment decision is “about” economic development of the CBD via densification.
Simply repeating your opinion over and over is not a convincing argument. Why you are fixated on the idea that a complex piece of infrastructure must only be about one thing perhaps speaks more to the limits of your conception of it than the likely outcomes. Yes, the CRL will make living, working, playing in the CBD a much more efficient and pleasurable business, and it will encourage the intensification that is already happening and is right now accelerating, and will bring a vitally need improvement to the quality of the growth there [by reducing destructive and wasteful traffic pressures]. Yes the CRL will facilitate a growth of economic vitality in the CBD, thankfully, that may struggle without it.
But an additional and very significant outcome of the CRL will be its ‘network effect’. The CRL is the difference between Auckland having a road-independant integrated network of fast and frequent travel and not having one at all. The benefit of this project is the transformation of the current suboptimal fractured system into something completely other than we have now. Transformation is not a word to use lightly, but is clearly warranted here; the change in possible movement patterns in Auckland that this project brings is hard to overstate, and with that a revolution in the very idea of itself as a city. That these effects occur on the entire network and not just in the CBD is clearly something you have trouble grasping.
Because the CRL is the key to running frequent and fast services on the entire existing network it will make living, and indeed working, in places like Pukekohe a much more viable proposition. Suburbia was first made possible by the train, and there is nothing about rail or other rapid transit systems that are incompatible with lower density areas. They are likely to facilitate a less diffuse spatial organisation than the near total autodependency of much of Auckland now but that does not mean they require them to already exist for the network to be efficient and used. With the coming integration of the bus network to the existing stations many more places will for the first time receive a viable connection to other parts of the network. But without the CRL that service will remain suboptimal, disconnected, and underperforming. The existing right of way and recent investment in AK’s rail system will remain underutilised until the CRL is built; Day and Night for all of Auckland, not just the CBD.
Yes you could route trains differently to get the frequency gains out on the rest of the network but there simply wouldn’t be the patronage to justify it. Yes the CRL adds capacity to the city centre where there isn’t enough but the rest of the network also benefits from that as there would be more trains between places like Henderson and New Lynn, trains that wouldn’t be able to be justified normally.
‘We should be on our guard’Yep. As I look out my widnow at work I can see the Red Army barrelling down the street behind tanks and other heavy artillery.I’m fuck*d now.The truth is actually that the Chinese and China could save the World from economic catastrophe. Indeed, China fed America for the last 20 years. And even if China was buying up Australia as you say, it was under the leadership of Howard, y’know that right winger: doesn’t say much for Rudd’s cosying up’ to them. Australia got rich on the back of that and undoubtedly we benefited. I welcome interaction with China. It is a magnificent country/economy and is full of colour and diversity.
What does China have to do with this thread?
MFD. Bollocks I’m afraid. The CRL is about the entire network. There is a constraint, it happens to be in the CBD but it still constrains the entire network, it limits frequency everywhere. It literally terminates services in the CBD. It reduces a potentially rich ROW to being in practice a weaker contributor to the transport infrastructure of the city. Think of the network as an old wooden barrel but with staves of different lengths; this barrel can only be filled with water to the height of the shortest stave. That stumpy stave is Britomart.
Because the tunnel linking the disconnected parts of the network will be under the city is it really that hard to grasp that this will have effects beyond the areas on the land above? If you fix a broken pipe does this not mean the ends are now connected again?
With the CRL the running pattern will no longer be in and out, but through. So it will be much much more able to support journeys other than just into town and home again. These journeys are unlikely to be greater in number than commutes and from the CBD but will actually be possible. The system will suddenly allow many more possible movements, will be much less bossy and much less focused on one point. Britomart is likely to no longer be even the busiest station.
Anyway what is your point? Some issue about the CBD, are you somehow bothered that it is and will remain the primary destination for a majority of travelers? If so why? Who cares where the problem is, so long as we are accurate about it? And you are right the next constraint will be on the spine of the system and that should be the next problem to solve, and?
Sorry if I’m a bit intense about this, but this misrepresentation about the CRL is very frustrating, as the CRL is the difference between Auckland having a real and functioning rail network and not. It is about a better service at the edges, and about justifying expansion to new places. Yes it is, in many ways, only a beginning, but it is the essential key to getting a real functioning network; it will be night and day from the half pie point-to-point disconnected two and a half lines we currently have.
Also if capacity is increased for the CBD, where have these riders come from? On a network these points are indivisible. A new rider to the city has to come from somewhere, and that somewhere is in the wider region. The demand that the centre creates affords the frequency at the margins; every point grows together.
Doctor, it hurts when I do this…
Britomart constraints the entire network not because of the physical track layout but because of the contention that every train must go/from Britomart. Without disputing its validity, it is that contention that leads to the inevitable conclusion that the CRL is overwhelmingly about capacity to and from the CBD. To state that the CRL is necessary to increase train frequency elsewhere on the network is factually incorrect as my hypothetical example illustrates. I have read the original business case for the CRL several times and the same conclusion is reached. This conclusion does not bother me at all – it makes the decisions easier.
MFD, you can’t solve the Newmarket problem without the CRL either remember. I assume you’re suggesting run a heap of trains west to south and then a shuttle from Newmarket to Britomart. To achieve that you’re going to need to probably put another two tracks under Newmarket – which would be a pretty massive cost. Not as much as CRL of course, but still a pretty big cost for relatively little benefit compared to the benefits provided by CRL.
Your assumption is incorrect. Do you not understand the word hypothetical?
Just note that the capacities shown in the diagram are not very accurate. Busways can carry far more than 10,000 passengers per hour – in fact the Northern Busway will approach that number in the next few years. The busway box should probably match the LRT box, and if you were running double-deckers down the busway then you would probably carry more on BRT …
exactly!the adelaide o-bahn busway is currently capable of carrying up to 20,000 people per hour in each direction by a fleet of small articulated buses(source:see south australia passenger transport board’s website).
capacity of a busway with grade-separated right of way is similar to that of light rail, not considerably less as is claimed by some heavily biased rail/tram literature.
The CRL is, to sum it up in a few words “a heart transplant” for PT.
As with a heart transplant for the body, it will fix the whole body, from the fingers & the toes at the edges, right up to the brain and everything else in between and its not just about fixing the heart (although thats the part that is replaced).
The CRL is the same, except its a transplant that makes the entire PT network (and not just “fix the trains”). It makes the PT network well (for the first time in its life).
Basically Auckland PT network has suffered from a congenital heart defect since birth (an some would say actually from its inception).
So, by doing the CRL “heart transplant” we’re finally curing the heart defect and making the network well.
And like heart transplants, PT transplants aren’t cheap, but if you want to patient to recover, you gotta do it. End of story, no matter the cost. If you don’t you consign the patient (Auckland PT and the users of it) to a slow death.
Perhaps AT could use that in their marketing (if they ever started doing any that is) 🙂
its a transplant that makes the entire PT network well?
how would the crl benefit the north shore and the ferry network esp the like of waiheke island ferry&bus??pray tell.(do not tell me that heaps of competing buses can be removed post crl,thus relocate the fundings to ferry and shore buses)
James the places that the CRL will help the least are indeed those places not directly connected to the RTN network. Like Grey Lynn where I live. But by lifting, significantly, the number of people not using their cars across the entire region it will improve the functionality of the whole of the city’s transport networks. You don’t have to be on a train to experience its effects. But also it is the necessary first stage in rail reaching the Shore, as well as an important step on moving more people to see the value in using PT systems in AK and yes that likely will have a flow on effect in ridership on ferries and the buses on the Northern Busway, leading to scope for improvement in frequency and quality of these services. As well as freeing up downtown street space for those buses to operate in their most congested part of their route; in the CBD.
Rail will cross the harbour, and that will be the next big debate once the CRL is operating, but building a network is a big and steady business and requires that projects are done in turn. Should I have opposed the building of the Northern Busway because I don’t live on the Shore, or any other project in some other area? I don’t drink your tap water either….
RTN network??i suppose you mean rail network?i couldn’t help but think that the only places that would directly benefit from the crl are those inner city suburbs.i fail to see how the crl benefits those who live far away from the railway tracks let alone those who live in the remote suburbans.
the crl will only benefit those who catch the trains to the cbd and its surrounding suburbans in close proximity.
Well that is quite true even if you don’t want to hear it. Reallocating bus resources away from long one-way commuter routes in parallel to the rail lines will be a huge benefit. That will free up the resources for things like an upper harbour rapid bus corridor to link the North Shore to West Auckland, not to mention a heap of local frequent feeders-circulators for getting around your local area.
Having said that, the biggest value of the CRL for North Shore folk and Waiheke commuters will be that it makes it much easier to get to a whole bunch of places other than downtown. Come in by ferry from Waiheke and you can connect to the frequent train out to New Lynn and be there in less than 20 minutes. Catch the NEX in and you can get out to K Rd or Newton in a matter of minutes, ride the new Beachhaven ferry in to town and hop on the train to Glen Innes if you study at Tamaki Campus. The CRL would allow the eastern line to run at five minute headways, so all of a sudden you connection time is almost negligible.
It makes a lot of sense to get those trunk rapid transit corridors humming f you consider the future public transport system as an integrated regionwide network rather than just a collection of separate routes feeding commuters to downtown.
again nick you have totally ignored the size of the current rail network,its small and somehow indirect comparing with other urban rail networks aroung the globe.axing buses from the backbone transport network in order to maximise the benefit of the rail services will only result in generating too many gaps in the network thus encouraging more cars on the road to fill the gaps.
public transport is all about serving the communities,its up to the communities and the travling public to decide what services to run not you nick or the whole lot of dumb arse at mrcagney.
I haven’t ignored the size of the rail network, it is a network that stretches to the extremities of the city some 30km south and 20km west of the centre. Both the main lines nicely bisect the main corridors of population and development to the west and south, and the southern line is incredibly direct. It’s an almost straight line from Papakura to Britomart!
But really, where do you get the idea that I want to axe buses from the backbone of the transport network?
What I said that we should reallocate bus resources away from long commuter routes in parallel to the rail lines, this is just about removing unnecessary duplication in the same corridors. So there will still be bus services in those corridors to service local trips, there will still be bus services leading to and from those trunk routes, and there will still be many bus routes operating the backbone of the public transport network in corridors where there is no rail.
I know you’re a serious bus fan from your previous posts about the place, but perhaps you should realise that most other people aren’t actually prejudiced when it comes to public transport modes. Like I said above it pays to consider the public transport system as region wide integrated network. Why would you waste all those buses running them on long routes right next to a train that’s doing exactly the same thing, wouldn’t you want to use those buses somewhere they could provide a useful service?
Oh, and please keep your insults and vitriol to yourself. We appreciate people posting their views and opinions and fostering healthy debate is the whole point of this place, but trolling and slander aren’t welcome. It’s very easy for us to delete your posts and block you if you keep it up.
Actually, it is up to the transport network operator to decide what services to run. The travelling public would like many more services than are feasible, and it is the job the of the operator to determine which services are feasible and how they should be provided. That means rationing scarce resources to achieve the maximum benefit for the lowest cost. It is not in keeping with that fundamental duty to have long-distance bus services that effectively duplicate a long-distance rail route, and it’s an historic accident of neoliberal economical batshittery that we are in that situation now.
For AT to scrap the rail-duplicating bus services and replace them with feeder services to rail stations increases the network utilisation overall, decreases road congestion (albeit by a minor level since buses don’t add all that much to congestion), and allows much better levels of service to people who live too far away from a rail station to easily take advantage of what will soon become a much faster service. Are you really so thoroughly pro-bus/anti-rail that you would rather we enforce continued use of buses in competition to rail, with the associated poorer service levels?
Hello people
I have some questions about Transport Spending and Levels Of Service, but first please could you do a quick check that I have my basic facts correct. sorry if the grammers not to good.
Auckland Transport Network, route Whangarei too Tauranga is only as good as its weakest point.
This transport route is only useful to business and commuters if the takt time is known, for this reason the LOS on this route needs to be known when there is a Stable flow (C).
1. Freight service: Whangarei too Auckland only has a LOS C for about 11? hours per day, Auckland port too Southdown/Wiri has LOS C for about 10? hours per day. Southdown/Wiri too Tauranga has LOS C for about 20? hours per day.
2. Sprint Passenger, Courier: 80 km/h
Mr. W lives in Whangarei and works in Manukau. 2 1/2 hours travel time. route has LOS C for 8? hours.
Mr. T lives in Tauranga works in Manukau 2 1/2 hours travel time, route has LOS C for 16? hours per day.
Mrs. W lives in Whangarei works in Albany 2 hours travel time. route has LOS C for 23? hours per day.
Mr. H lives in Hamilton works in Albany 2 hour travel time. route has LOS C for 10? hours per day.
3. Stop service passenger:
Bus service between Whangarei and Auckland 14 per day LOS F, Auckland and Tauranga 20 per day LOS E-.
Between Auckland and Hamilton there are 40 Buses per day LOS D-,
Between Manukau and Auckland CBD Frequency LOS C, Hours of service LOS A, 23 km 40 minutes travel time at 60 km/h.
Between Auckland CBD and Albany Frequency and Hours of service LOS B, 18 km 30 minutes travel time at 60 km/h.