Sometimes the comments in posts take an interesting turn and yesterdays post was one such occasion with a discussion about what to do with Britomart when we build the CRL so I thought it might be worth a separate post to look at the issues. When we build the CRL the plan has always been to ‘plug’ it into the back Britomart connecting to tracks 1 and 5 but thing I am really concerned about is the impact that would have on the rest of the station. Those two platforms would be very heavily used while the remaining platforms would be largely empty except for perhaps the occasional future regional service or trains like the Northern Explorer. I think there needs to more thought put into the impacts of this so I have put together a few of the options mentioned.
Option 1 – Connect to Platform 1 and 5 but leave the rest of the station as is
This would probably be the cheapest and easiest option but I think there is one big drawback to this option and that is simply the capacity of the platforms. Even today we see that when a full train turns up the platforms become quickly overwhelmed, this is made worse if there are a lot of people also waiting to get onto that same train which is something that frequently happens. We will soon be getting larger capacity trains which will mean even more people getting out on to these same platforms. The platforms also take a long time to clear so with the CRL running at high frequencies we could really start running into problems.
Option 2 – Build new platforms ‘behind the walls’
One thing many people don’t know is that there is actually space behind the coloured walls, this was originally intended to be used by light rail vehicles to get to the surface from where they would then run on the surface at street level. This is something that simply can’t happen any more due to the number of trains that we need to get into and out of Britomart meaning that there just isn’t the capacity to allow this to happen. We might be able to modify the space to allow for an additional platform for boarding or disembarking. If we did this I would still be concerned about the numbers on each platform as areas like the stairs and escalators already get easily overloaded so having more people in a smaller space isn’t going to help.
Option 3 – Widen the existing platforms
Another option could be to widen the existing platforms by removing one of the existing tracks, this would provide much more space for people to move about within the station while still having a few places for regional trains to terminate. It would require some modification to the existing layout but hopefully shouldn’t be anything too difficult. Personally I think that this might end up being the best option as it also allows us better reflect how our priorities have changed since the station was originally built. It also still allows us space to potentially develop regional services in the future where perhaps 4-6 services an hour could terminate.
Option 4 – A new dedicated CRL station
This is Nick Rs preferred solution and it could provide quite a bit of additional capacity to the rail network but one of my major concerns is that without a major investment to develop a quite a number of regional services that the existing station would be largely empty for most of the day. This would likely hurt any future development of rail such as extensions to the airport or to the North Shore as opponents would use it as an example of a wasted resource.
I suspect we will just end up with option one as it is the cheapest to do but I do hope that the project team look what will be the best solution long term although I guess that options two or three could be developed in the future if needed.
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I like option 2 best, as it offers more redundancy for (perhaps unplanned) terminating trains.
Given the space was designed to allow a ramp for light rail, surely we could fit some more stairs and escalators up through there too?
There is another variant on option 3 that would be easier to build, that would be removing track number three and widening the central platform in it’s place so that it faces track 2. Then the two outer platforms can have a barrier erected along their inside face (like the one the middle platform has on one side now) allowing the full width of each other platform to be dedicated to servicing just one track. So it would be north platform for track 1 only, central platform for tracks 2 and 4, south platform for track 5 only.
The key benefit of that is you don’t have to relocate any tracks or any of the stairs/elevators at the eastern end, it would just be a case of removing one track and replacing it with platform. Another outcome is the ‘metro’ tracks would have their own platforms while both terminal tracks are accessed from a terminal only platform. A key thing there is you could furnish the platforms appropriately, i.e. minimal clutter and obstacles on the metro platforms but more seating and the like on the terminal ones. You could also easily gate off the metro platforms with fare gates, but leave the terminal platform openly accessible for things like the Overlander that are ticketed the old fashion way.
In any case a combination of two and three would be possible too.
My train arrives on platform 1 in the mornings and people already spill out all over platform 2 as well. Things would be improved by removing much of the seating but the biggest problem is the columns which act to funnel people away from the centre so take up a lot more usable space than they appear to. I was trying to improve on that issue but agree the cost to modify the eastern end might end up ruling it out.
I am going to do a post in the next few days to look at how many regional services we might actually have in the future (if we can get them going) to help the debate about how much space is needed at Britomart for them.
I think it would be a major, if you look down the eastern end there are structural supports and the central lift/stair shaft right where the tracks would have to go.
Those columns are an issue, but I think it could be helped a lot by removing all the square metal cladding and crap around them and just leaving the relatively narrow concrete cylinders. This pic here shows them under construction without any hooha http://www.profilecurvers.co.nz/images/britomart.jpg.
As for the regional services post, great idea. I imagine the biggest issue wouldn’t be the platforms (probably do with a single island just fine) but the access to the station. After all they still have to enter and exit through that same throat tunnel along with all the CRL trains, taking up two slots in the process and requiring the station throat crossovers to be moved out of the ‘straight through’ position. Did you see my idea of how to bypass CRL trains around the crossovers in the post you got those images from?
Things looked a lot cleaner in that pic, there isn’t all of the diesel fumes to darken the metal 🙂 I was looking at the station this afternoon and while the supports are an issue perhaps more of an issue are the metal poles about 3m high that hold the PIDs.
Yep, I think I remember suggesting something like that to you which lead you creating that pic.
You may well find that the steelwork surrounding the columns isn’t just cosmetic and has a design function to protect the concrete in the event of a bomb blast or derailment.
What about option 2 + option 3. Arriving passengers disembark to the narrow/new side and quickly vacate the platform. Departing passengers have more space on the column side of the track, so better for waiting. Then the train itself can help out by opening the arrival side first, and departing side 5 sec later. All of this stops the intermingling of arriving and departing passengers.
The first question that has to be asked is where the end position is, and making sure that any short term gain does not impact on future development. The key question to be answered is ‘what would the bay platform be for?’
If, as was suggested in an earlier debate, the plan is for 30tph through the core (ie 1½ minute headway ½ minute dwell, and suitable new units provided with fast accelleration, and wide and slick doors) then there is no point to the bays at all in the future apart from the dispatching and receiving the Northern Explorer and other Regional / inter-regional trains, as well as operating the station in times of planned or unplanned disruption. The through platforms would handle as many trains as the approaching routes can throw at them. If this were the case then a future reduction in the number of bays may be credible. However, a failed unit that is ‘got rid of’ into a bay soon make 2 (now 1) bay platform quite a small number.
However, if unremarkable units are used, then perhaps a train every 4 four minutes is more realistic for the through platforms (2 minute headway, 2 minute dwell). So the feeder routes can supply more trains than the through platforms can handle. To have the network working at maximum capacity in the peak bay platforms will continue to be necessary to handle those additional commuter trains – as well as the Northern Explorer and inter-regional services. The number of bays required will depend on the various headways and dwell times, but I would be hesitant about going away from the existing three in that scenario.
Track layout is currently not ideal. Even with the through lines in place, with the existing throat is still not good. An arrival into P2 or P3 stops the job, as does a departure from P4. That use of both up and down lines to access the bays locks the up and down lines together, an in effect only half as many trains can use the bays without impacting on the through capacity than would be the case if the layout were better. It would be so much better if the three bay platforms could all be reached off the up without touching the down, and depart to the down without touching the up. That poor layout already impacts capacity. Currently the station needs 5 bay platforms to operate, and part of the reason is that the poor number of parallel moves means that often platforms can’t be cleared quickly enough. Any aspiration to reduce the number of bay platforms prior to the through lines being in operation would need to address the throat layout and make it more efficient.
There two down-sides to the new platforms being on the outside, one constructional and one operational. With construction, in creating the through lines, by creating the platforms on the outside, in order to access them another two or four sets of stairs, four or eight sets of escalators, and four sets of lifts need to be provided. That’s additional cost, and space. In terms of oprations, currrently, having got to the platform concourse a passnger, possibly with a buggy or wheel-chair, can reach any platform easily when in times of disruption platforms are switched. With platforms on the outside platforms, and through lines in place, if the announcement is that the through train is delayed and the next departure is off a bay, an entire platform’s-worth of people, including buggys and wheelchairs, has to go up and over the track to reach the bays. So the question has to be asked as to whether that layout with platforms on the outside really is the desired layout.
The current layout may not be good, but there needs to be a vision of where we are going to end up, both in terms of services and layouts, and how we get there, before we plan to tinker with it.
Don’t forget that installing the CRL complete with additional CBD stations would significantly unload Britomart from bearing the full burden of the passenger demand as it does at the moment.
Yes that is true, for the moment but long term that will change as patronage keeps increasing and more development happens at that end of town.
Start with Building new single track under Quay st from the strand area, with platform on Britomart side of track, with its main passager access in to existing Britomart Station at a shortened Track 1 area. this would gives long term fix to the 2 track entrance/exist problem of Britomart station.
From here you could split the CRL tunnels build in to 5 projects.
1. Track 5 tunnel to Newton. open single track Rail link
2. Build Aotea Station. open Aotea
3. Tunnel Newton to Quay St Tunnel. Expanding capacity
4. Build K rd station
5. Build Newton Station
It might be worth mentioning that the construction work taking place behind that wall on the Country End of Platform 1 is to allow an alternate routing into platforms 1 and 2, so that Platform 3 can be used on either side of the station independant of Platforms 1 and 2 – as at present, Platform 3 is on the Down Main side only…
Have been following these last couple of posts with interest and I find myself agreeing with Nick. As much as a second Britomart would be political suicide, it seems stupid to use the ability to unlock the latent capacity of the rail network as a key selling point of the CRL, but then to only have a 30tph capacity post-CRL. Using former admin’s suggested two-service pattern (1. West-South via CRL; 2. Onehunga/Airport-Manukau via CRL/Eastern Line), 30tph at Britomart translates to a max frequency of 8mins for each direction on each of those services – a bit of a let-down when a lot of the network could support a sub-5min frequency, and not exactly future-proof.
I’ve just had a (possibly stupid) brainwave about how to possibly address the inevitable “white elephant” argument… Instead of using the outer tracks at Britomart to plug into the CRL, could we use them instead to plug into a future North Shore line? I’m sure there’s plenty of technical reasons why this can’t happen, but on the understanding that the rest of the network runs through the new Britomart metro station, using ‘old’ Britomart as the plug-in point for North Shore rail makes some sort of sense: 1. It would take care of some of the political fallout by getting the Shore onside, getting rid of the “what’s in the CRL for us” argument; 2. It would mean that ‘old’ Britomart would be used for something other than regional trains, again less of a white elephant; 3. It could cut down the costs/design complexity associated with a cross-city tunnel that would be needed to plug a North Shore link in at Aotea.
So we’d have the CRL largely go ahead as planned, with Nick’s new Britomart metro station to ensure capacity is fully utilised, and ‘old’ Britomart would be used largely as a regional service terminus until North Shore rail goes ahead in 15-odd years time.
It’s a longshot…feel free to shoot down, I’m sure its somehow infeasible 😉
Just a point of clarification Liam, the supposed 30tph is per direction. If you run four lines and two pairs routed through the CRL that allows for four minute headways on each line.
But that 30tph would only be possible if Quay Park and Mt Eden junctions were grade separated (and Newmarket too, effectively), and more critically only if nothing terminated at Britomart.
There’s the rub, if we want to maximise the capacity of the CRL we would have to operate Britomart as a simple two track through station. It would be functionally identical to Aotea, K Rd or Newton, or in other words empty at the middle three tracks and overloaded on the outside two… that begs the question why not just build another K Rd or Newton station alongside instead, in a cheap cut and cover box just below street level. Such a station would be purposed designed to handle an EMU every two minutes each way, unlike Britomart which is designed to handle terminating diesel trains.
Construction wise it would be a lot easier I expect: no modifying a working station, no digging under the CPO building and a less tight curve to get to Albert St. And because the Quay St platforms could be just below street level the rail level might be only half as deep as Britomart, which means Aotea and K Rd could be less deep, and/or the grade between them eased.
The only real objection I can see is the fact it would leave Britomart underutilized, initially at least. One idea I’ve been toying with is using part of that not inconsiderable space as a bus interchange. So perhaps keep the two rail tracks and a pair of platforms for terminal trains, and use 3/5 of the width for buses instead of having them stop all over the place at street level. Building ramps down to the station to bus design geometry would be relatively simple, I guess you’d need to connect to Fanshawe and Albert at one end and Anzac/Beach and Quay St at the other.
Nick don’t we want to decrease road traffic down there and not stimulate it? It doesn’t look like the right place for a bus station to me. But leaving the Terminus as a terminus does have merit, still a very hard sell especially right now as intercity services are cutting back [because they’re crap].
If the Britomart Metro idea is a similar cost to faffing with the existing station it could be the best solution… although do you just connect the Eastern Line to it? Although then the Southern services all have to terminate still…. tricky? And then there is the White Elephant argument….? Not that it cost that much, about a new motorway lane and interchange, or half the cost of the Vic Park underpass….
Couple of things there Patrick as far as I see it:
1) Buses aren’t going away, in fact even with the CRL all the projections are for greater bus volumes in the CBD with increased demand and frequency. All rail intensive cities in the world are also bus intensive, the rising tide lifts all boats. Take London, Paris or New York for example, mega metro systems but they still have a serveral buses a minute on their main city streets. While we should reduce road traffic that has to be mostly at the expense of cars, not buses.
2) Britomart is the ideal place for a bus terminus, mostly due to the harbour forming the one impermeable edge of the CBD. Basically you want to bring every bus across all the CBD to give maximum coverage. In some cases that may involve linking east to west as through routes, but there will always be a huge amount of service from the south, east and west that enters the CBD on the southern side, covers across in a north-south direction then find itself at the harbour needing to turn around or route somewhere else.
3) Having an underground bus terminus gets buses off street for part of their route, including the critical turn around movement. Currently almost all the buses use Quay St or the lanes to turn. A question that no one seems to be asking at the moment is if we want to make Quay St pedestrian only as per the city centre master plan, then how the hell are you supposed to run around the block? You’d have to start using the Fort St shared space or something, far from ideal, especially with growing bus volumes. An off street terminus with turnaround capacity solves that problem and means we can pedestrianise Quay and Queen, plus keep buses off the smaller lanes and side streets (shared spaces I’d hope) at the same time.
IMHO regardless of what happens with the CRL, we will need an off-street bus facility downtown to achieve the city’s urban design goals. If the CRL runs on purpose designed platforms, then I think there is plenty of room in Britomart for both a pair of intercity rail platforms and really superior bus interchange (which means those diesel fans and the like don’t go to waste). That gets rid of the white elephant argument and helps us tidy up the downtown streets.
I did suggest that just the eastern line connect to the new (temporarily terminal) platforms in the first stage, but that was simply an exercise in establishing the smallest first stage that could ease the capacity crisis. The second stage involves adding the missing connection to the southern line in conjunction with the extension to Aotea. There is plenty of room in and around Quay Park to build the required links. This is essential because that new tunnel goes on to be the full CRL and obviously we want the southern line running through it, plus otherwise it’s a big waste building a 30tphpd tunnel that only one line with run through at about 12tphpd.
I think that the best bet may well be option 4 and routing the CRL tunnel to the north of Britomart with a pair of new platforms. I’m not quite sure about where you’d plug in a North Shore link, but I’m not convinced it should go through the middle of Britomart either for reasons I’ll explain below.
Sure, building anything new at Britomart is going to be a hard sell, but there are some good reasons:
1) An intensive rail service (presumably what’s wanted) works best when you have a single route and a pair of tracks with external interfaces minimised. Trains go from one end to the other, terminate, then go back again. Operational complexity is minimised and with automated operation you can run a very dense service indeed. Now this may be tricky to achieve with the CRL, but the closer you can get, the better. Routing through Britomart will not give you that operational separation. In fact, perhaps at least one of the arms of the network shouldn’t go through the CRL and should terminate in Britomart to avoid complexity?
2) I suspect that the track and platform layout at Britomart (particularly the station throat and approach lines to the east) just aren’t up to the demands that would be placed on them. Anything entering or leaving is going to conflict with an intensive CRL service. All you need is a set of points to fail and you are stuffed. If you had a dedicated pair of tracks and platforms for the CRL you might be able to get away with it, but I don’t think that’s possible without a lot of digging.
3) Equally, is the layout of the current Britomart really suited to the kind of passenger flows that the CRL would result in? From a resilience point of view, putting the CRL through the existing Britomart puts all your eggs in one basket. A fire alarm or a security alert and the city’s rail network grinds to a halt. With two separate halves to the station, there is a degree of operational flexibility.
4) Tinkering with live facilities, especially where there’s an intensive service is inherently expensive, risky and disruptive. It can sometimes be less expensive to build something new than to interface with an existing facility.
5) There’s almost certainly a PR angle that Britomart is a roaring success and this is about freeing up capacity for the next 20 years of growth. As oil prices go up and more places in Auckland are rail-accessible, taking the train rather than driving, flying or taking the coach is going to become more compelling. Indeed, opening up paths into Britomart should help make medium distance services such as Auckland to Hamilton viable, it would be a perfect terminus for an airport express service, and perhaps there’s some scope for more tourist services? Of course in the short-term it needs to be seen to have traffic, so it might be worthwhile leaving at least one of the lines terminating there.
Just adding my few cents 😉
I tend to side with option 4. I know ‘old’ Britomart will be under utilised but when you think about it, most cities in the world have a main terminating station in the city centre to serve longer distance trains that is separate from the rest of the network. Personally I think New Zealand could grow its long distance rail network and a five platform terminus station would provide plenty of capacity. A factor that must be considered when weighing up the costs of these schemes is the opportunity cost of not being able to run regional services under option 1. There will be a lot more under utilisation under option 1 because there will be no capacity left and platforms 2,3&4 will not be able to be used at all. Any regional services would require the use of The Strand and if you want to make that an appealing place, you’ll have to set aside a few million for an upgrade there.
I’m fairly late to this discussion, but I am coming round to the idea of building a second ‘underground’ station for the CRL. The reason is simple: you can never have too many platforms.
One of the headaches we have where I am, is the keen desire to add more train services, and indeed the political will and money to do it. But significant constraints at the two main terminus stations means that we are limited in doing so. Operationally, a mix of through-running and terminating platforms allow more flexibility.
The other thing that could be achieved with a Quay St station would be a passenger tunnel to the ferry building finally.
You’d assume that they would have to link the old and new sides of the station with an expanded pedestrian underpass, plus overy to Ferry Terminal and back to Queen St on the southern side of Quay St.
I’d have assumed it would have been done when Britomart was built so I’ve given up on assuming anything :-).
Well that was part of the original design. Not only was the existing concourse supposed to reach right into the downtown mall, but there was supposed to be a second perpendicular underpass from the ferry building to Queen St connecting to it.
However when Banks was voted in and discovered he couldn’t cancel Britomart outright he proceeded to cut out anything that was considered absolutely essential, so the underpass was chopped and we got the large and ineffectual glass canopy thingy at street level instead.
Building the CRL requires digging up QEII square and demolishing some (hopefully all) of the downtown mall, so it would be easy to build in the underpasses then instead of filling the holes with dirt again.
This discussion really needs to take place in the context of some real numbers. I guess it is conceivable that Option 4 may not cost much different from connecting to existing platforms? It would still remain a tricky to sell unless it actually came in as cheaper or the same. It is also regrettable that this comes what will almost certainly turn out to be the low tide point of intercity rail services which makes the argument for retaining the existing platforms harder to pitch…. Any one better placed than me care to punt at cost differences?
To be honest I like the idea of option number 3. It won’t cost a lot at all, it will increase capacity (in terms of how many people can be on the platform at one time), and it’s as future proofed as you’ll get for hardly any money at all. We don’t underutilise anything, we expand capacity, and it’ll fit with the rest of the network.
Option 1 for the CRL, and Option 4 for the North Shore Link? Britomart for West-South and Quay for North-East. QE2 pedestrian underpass extended from Queen St to Ferry Terminal.
Platforms 1-2 and 4-5 already have issues with overcrowding, although the same occurs at most major stations around the world. Just means timing arrivals and departures to avoid simultaneous berthing.
One of the earlier reports for the Waikato Connection (2006 or 2008?) mentioned Britomart could be reconfigured for 6 platforms, but had no details of how (or links).
Not that I support CRL, but here’s a suggestion:
– build the CRL tracks in the ‘tunnels behind the walls’ (let’s call them tracks 0 and 6), then extend platform 1 over track 1 and platform 5 over track 5. ie widen the two outermost platforms.
You still have 5 tracks and platforms, with CRL feeding 2 tracks through and out the existing Britomart entry tunnel, but now the CRL tracks will feed (roughly) 7m wide platforms. Should be wide enough to handle projected extra passenger numbers.
A secondary problem is pasenger pedestrian flows through ground floor foyer to CPO doors into QE2 square. It’s quite congested around top of escalators and stairs, especially with info/ticket counter queues. May need to bring the central elevated platform down to become part of the main foyer floor walkways?
Just to clarify – when I suggest ‘extending platform 1 over track 1’, I mean replacing track 1 by a much wider platform 1 (so CRL track 0 offloads people onto a widened platform 1). Ditto for platform 5 extending to replace track 5 (thus serving the CRL track 6)
I would reject all options and leave Britomart as two through lines and have the North Shore line go through Aotea Station and onto a new Strand station (The old railway station) that would also be the long distance train station. The line would then link on to the eastern line. The southern line would go through Newmarket. Long distance buses could also be located at this site. The requirements of a long distance station are quite different to a metro station. I don’t think there is much room under Quay Street as there are a fair bit of stormwater works under Quay Street.
They should have built Britomart right in the first place where all platforms are like the New Market or other countries like Japan where all platforms are separated and people have to take the right escalator to get to the right platform…Also they should place markings for where people should stand between and mark where the doors will land so people inside the train get first priority disembarking…Just like in places like Hong Kong or Japan
You obviously don’t remember the hoo haa at the time about even building Britomart. Many didn’t see the need for it at all (much like that other white elephant – the Northern Busway. sarcasm)