Auckland’s Transport’s patronage results for September are now out and they show that the city is experiencing spectacular PT growth, growth which is also setting a number of records. The big news was earlier in the week was that when it was announced that over the last year there had been more than 12 million rail trips on the rail network and that for the first time more trips than the rail network in Wellington. As it turns out the 12 million trips milestone has actually occurred some-time in October rather than in September. Here are the highlights according to AT.
Auckland public transport patronage totalled 73,957,488 passenger trips for the 12 months to Sep-2014, an increase of +1.1% on the 12 months to Aug-2014 and +7.6% on the 12 months to Sep-2013. September monthly patronage was 6,612,702, an increase of 782,718 boardings or +13.4%on Sep-2013, normalised to ~ +11.0% accounting for special event patronage, one more businessand one less weekend day in Sep-2014 compared to Sep-2013. Financial year to date patronage has grown by + 8.5%.
Rail patronage totalled 11,923,347 passenger trips for the 12 months to Sep-2014, an increase of +1.7% on the 12 months to Aug-2014 and +16.7% on the 12 months to Sep-2013. Patronage for
Sep-2014 was 1,119,230, an increase of 194,217 boardings or +21.0% on Sep-2013, normalised to ~ +21.2%. Financial year to date rail patronage has grown by +16.8%.The Northern Express bus service carried 2,540,018 passenger trips for the 12 months to Sep-2014, an increase of +1.6% on the 12 months to Aug-2014 and + 11.1% on the 12 months to Sep-2013.Northern Express bus service patronage for Sep-2014 was 234,282, an increase of 40,686 boardings or +21.0% on Sep-2013, normalised to ~ +20.8%. Financial year to date Northern Express patronage has grown by +18.6%.
Bus services excluding Northern Express carried 54,387,408 passenger trips for the 12 months to an increase of +1.0% on the 12 months to Aug-2014 and +6.2% on the 12 months to Sep-2013. Bus services excluding Northern Express patronage for Sep-2014 was 4,887,764, anincrease of 516,418 boardings or +11.8% on Sep-2013, normalised to ~ +8.8%. Financial year to date bus services excluding Northern Express patronage has grown by +7.1%.
Ferry services carried 5,106,715 passenger trips for the 12 months to Sep-2014, an increase of +0.6% on the 12 months to Aug-2014 and an increase +2.0% on the 12 months to Sep-2013. Ferry services patronage for Sep-2014 was 371,426, an increase of 31,397 boardings or +9.2% on Sep-2013, normalised to ~ +8.1%. Financial year to date ferry patronage has decreased by -0.3%.
At 73.96 million trips to the end of September represents a massive jump in usage compared to last year and even from last month when the total was 73.14 million trips. Importantly it’s not just from the growth of rail but increased bus patronage too that’s causing this surge. The Northern Express along is up 21% on the same month last year. It definitely appears that AT’s major projects such as integrated ticketing and electrification are starting to pay off and with so much positive change to go the tend is only likely to accelerate. One little milestone that did occur is that per capita we crossed 48 trips per person which is the first time that’s happened since 1989.
The rail patronage growth has been stunning for months and is really highlighted on the Onehunga and Manukau lines – the only two running electric trains so far – which respectively saw a 32.6% and a 50.6% increase for the month compared to the same time last year. I’ve personally really been noticing of late that both buses and trains have been getting very full, even if travelling against the peak flow such as from the North Shore to the city in the afternoon suggesting that we’re likely to see this strong patronage growth continue in October and be hopefully beyond.
Crucially the growth of PT is also happening faster than the population growth in Auckland with the latest results showing Auckland increasing at 2.3% per annum. With PT having grown as 7.6% over the last year it shows the growth is coming from many existing Aucklanders.
Moving on to other modes, for Ferries one thing that did catch my attention was this patronage graph. Significantly they have split out ferry patronage by whether the service is subsidised (contracted) or not. As I understand it only the Devonport and Waiheke runs are exempt and the graph shows how significant the patronage from those two locations compared to the rest of the ferry destinations.
Lastly after a few lower months (possibly due to a faulty counter) cycling numbers are up 6.3% on September last year and 11% on a 12m basis (despite what the Monthly Cycle Monitoring Report says). Partly because we’re now in spring but it certainly feels like in seeing a lot more people out and about on bikes, even compared to previous years.
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Excellent stuff, and a credit to Aucklanders who continue to suffer through breakdowns and delays on the train network (or at least the Western line).
If we weren’t overcrowding services, and had the electrics in full service, we’d see even more. There’s a lot of latent demand, it simply needs Auckland Transport to do simple things like putting on more services – hopefully PTOM allows this. I’m concerned about the new GPS, which seems to indicate that the government will put even more pressure on councils to reduce services and increase fares.
86% of the trips made a year on rails are made on the weekdays according some back of the envelope calculation using AT average business day figures (about 43,000 PAX a day according to the current report, times 240 “work” days a year – out of the annual 365 days, less public holidays, annual shutdowns and weekends = over 10.3 m or about 86% of 12m).
So with 15% only on weekends (and off peak) there is a ton of scope to grow the usage in weekends and off peak.
It AT could get the trains as well used in weekends as they are now in weekdays, we’d add another 4.4 million trips easy.
Most of the current weekday 10.3 m trips happen in the AM peak or after 3pm, so we have 6 hours interpeak between 9am and 3pm and evening hours to increase patronage further to drive growth.
Add cheaper off peak fares and family passes and capped weekly fares and such to the mix and suddenly “off peak” usage overall could become as big as normal “peak” time numbers. Add maybe 20,000 more to the daily usage for inter peak and evening business day travel and you’ve added 5-6 million more right there.
Add that the weekend usage and you’ve got your 20 million annual target reached with some to spare.
Really AT could achieve this sort of growth in 18 months if they really put the plans in place – and delivered using the same resources they have now (yes they’d need more drivers to run all those extra EMU services each day and weekends, but thats a really manageable problem I’m sure).
Here in Sydney, when using the HOP equivalent (Opal) the max fare on a Sunday is $2.50 (*), when I head into the city on Sundays the trains are full, of family’s going places on public transport.
(*) there is a weekly fare cap, so it maybe free, airport access fee still applies.
Another impressive number: Rapid Transit Network (rail plus Northern Express) 12 month rolling patronage = 14.46 million. Probably a bit higher as the NEX is not the only route running directly up and down the busway, with services also being provided by the 881 and various express buses.
And yet more money will be wasted on RoNS when we should be investing in bus & cycle ways and rail lines.
What are the performance targets for converting the Northern Busway to a dedicated transit corridor (Light/Heavy Rail) ?
If we don’t planning now, will we be caught out again?
It has a lot more capacity yet, especially if we sort out the city side and from Constellation to Albany. Even so you can pretty much guarantee we won’t do anything till it’s too late.
Has NZTA investigated whether it’s possible to convert the busway to rail of any form, on the same alignment, without shutting it down for a year or more?
I was also thinking about the nasty surprise/conditions attached to the government CRL funding. Setting the targets early and having a reasoned debate about what they are and why they’ve been set will help with the expectations management piece, by communicating effectively.
My thought for the CFN is that a series of preconditions should be able to be defined, so that if a project is going to be swapped from one time period to another, evidence can be used to justify the change in investment priorities.
Its great news all round.
For a laugh heres a recent blast from the past I found by accident the other day in the old Granny oops, Herald.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10873805
From 27 March 2013 and titled “City’s rail patronage goes off the tracks” – while this applied to the post-RWC patronage decline that happened in 2013 and was presented as a huge negative problem for AT.
Same title could equally applies right now, but in a 100% positive way – patronage is “off the tracks” all right.
Its through the roof and soaring above the new overhead wires into the blue yonder with the sort of levels of rail usage usage not seen in a very long time, if ever.
Same goes for the other RTN routes like NEX too.
However, that article does has some information which shows how far we have come in a short while, have a read (and a chuckle) at the usual “the sky is falling” coverage by the Herald on anything PT related.
At end of Feb 2013, article says, rail patronage declined to under 10 million, a figure it hit in 2011.
Yet here we are now, just over 18 months since then, and we have not only made up the lost patronage from the post-RWC bump and dip, we have gone over that rate further to 12 million as of sometime in early October.
The 10 million annual figure represented 4 times growth rate in the 10 years to 2013 (since Britomart opened in 2003).
So that is say an average of 8 million more users over 10 years, or about 1 million more users every year (its more or less been like that).
Now we’ve added 2 million more to go from 10 to 12 million in just over 18 months since that story appeared.
And that is with extensive and frequent weekend and a long Xmas shutdowns on all lines to electrify them.
So that rate of growth given these factors is truly stunning.
And the growth rate there will only increase once the Southern and Western lines get EMU’ed next year. And from what I see anytime I use the trains or read the patronage figures each month, they simply cannot come soon enough. We’ve had a lot of EMU’s delivered in the year since the first one arrived in August last year. And all of this years arrivals and those 7 EMU’s arriving in December will be desperately needed to help address the demand fountain during the next year thats for sure – CAF certainly seems to be powering ahead with building EMUs ahead of schedule, which is just as well it seems.
Meanwhile, the buses continue their sterling service, but they also need relief too – and the Integrated fares and PTOM rollout can’t come soon enough for those currently missing their buses on a regular basis as they’re “too full” or “too late” or simply “too small” to cater for the demand.
I guess the question needs to be asked, is that with the CAF EMU production and completion of initial 57 EMUs now coming into sight sooner than planned, should AT consider adding some more EMU’s to the initial 57 order to allow it to turn most of the 3 car EMUs into 6 car EMUs to manage the demand until CRL can be completed?
Can’t do 6 car EMUs on Onehunga so they’ll remain 3 car sets for now, but all the other lines can manage 6 car sets.
I think given the degree of “mode switching” that is happening at Panmure now and will happen at Otahuhu next year that the longer the trains are, the better all round.
Meanwhile, the level of VKT per capita is static at best, but the Government is throwing money down the more and wider roads path like this is the 1950’s, and also doubling down on sprawl while the real answer is simply staring them in the face.
Yes was thinking the herald had been very quiet on the patronage results.
This is a positive result alright, but is only the beginning of what should be. As George says, if we were to get lower fares and better frequencies we would really see these numbers moving up, with reduced traffic volumes and lower overall fuel usage. There’s a truckload of money to be saved here.
yes and that’s just the transport benefits. As PT patronage grows, access to services will start to become a major influence on land use patterns, i.e. where people choose to live, work, and love. Therein lies even greater spatial (economic) efficiencies …
Do we know if there is going to be another Christmas shutdown?
That will not be a good look to the new users plus pull down numbers if it happens.
I’m sure I saw a poster at Grafton station advertising a full network closure from xmas day to 4 January; and Western line closed until 11 January. Can’t find anything on AT’s website though.
Hope you weren’t planning to train to Sylvia park for boxing day sales!
It was mentioned in an earlier AT board report (and elsewhere) about the shutdown over Xmas.
As you say, small one over Xmas/New Year – supposedly they will do the rebuild of Otahuhu station “over the rails” at least in that time.
Is a bit disappointing to have this given all the shutdowns we’ve had for years now – as its an ideal time to experience the trains.
But maybe next Christmas, Santa will bring us a real working train set for Christmas?
(But not on Christmas Day mind as AT doesn’t run trains on that day).
Great result. Credit to all people and organisations involved.
Interesting to see growth surge on manukau line post campus opening.
Most of what were seeing has to be hop given how small rail network is overall. But once southern and western lines go electric we should see further patronage sparks.
“Most of what were seeing has to be hop given how small rail network is overall.”
I assume you mean the spectacular increase is driven by HOP uptake?
Well, considering that since early 2013 we’ve grown overall patronage on all modes from under 70 million to nearly 74 million and over 2 million of that growth has been due to rail alone and another million for the NEX and the rest for buses and ferries.
The price differential between Rail and Bus prices has been removed over that time (making rail more expensive over time not cheaper)
But you’d have to say that something is driving up the PT usage, and I doubt its HOP on its own doing most of that.
Its true that HOP allows proper apportionment of when people actually travel, not some assumption that 10 trips tickets are all used up the month the ticket is bought in. Which smooths the patronage bumps out for sure but doesn’t make the pot bigger.
And there have been no real changes to ticketing itself since HOP went in (except HOP now works on all modes) – the next big change will be integrated zonal fares.
I mainly think the lift really shows people are sick to the back teeth of traffic congestion – whether that be in the south, west, east or north and are realising that rail, the NEX and regular bus services are actually “good enough” right now to let some of them solve that problem for themselves – by using PT and they are voting with their feet.
Greg do you think it’s traffic congestion people are sick of or just driving in any condition? Looks to me like a considerable number of people are keen to not drive for any number of reasons and given even a half decent alternative are taking it…? Wait till they get a proper high frequency Rapid Network fully integrated with the rest of the services.
On the balance Patrick I think its mostly the numbers choosing to switch modes to PT over those choosing not to drive at all. There is an element of both I’m sure.
And while its subjective. On the whole considering that todays Press has this article (http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/10661464/Fewer-young-drivers-killed-on-the-roads) about the marked fall in Teenage driver accident stats over the last 4 years – which re still the biggest killer of this age group – the reasons for the fall are attributed to many factors but none to do with less “exposure” to the dangers of driving, by you know, actually driving less.
If the numbers of “driving age” teenagers and those in their twenties choosing not to was a big factor in the death stats drop that it would be mentioned as a cause.
You would have to assume that there is a decline in uptake of driving, and it is probably due to tougher tests and costs and the like to some degree but how much? Aye, there lies the rub.
Also, while we have added 1 million more PT trips in the last 6 months (according Lester Levy), we have not had a similar sized boost in overall population in Auckland or a sudden spurt of previously would have driven people entering the system that I’ve seen, so something else must be driving the usage of PT up.
We’ve also not seen the “usual suspects” trotted out recently the likes which also always include “higher petrol prices”.
And while mortgage rates have risen, so disposable income will have dropped this year, thats usually a bad thing for PT as most people argue PT is “too expensive” relative to driving so wouldn’t be a factro here either.
So if its not these factors alone or in the majority combination, the only logical conclusion is that the bulk of the growth is coming from former car drivers sick of traffic congestion delays (or former “bus all the way users, now switching at Panmure and doing part of it by rail).
AT probably knows way more about the demographics and sources of the growth (at a station and HOP card user level) than we do. So there is something going on.
Time will show us the answers, whether any of that truth will convince Central Government to start CRL any time this decade is simply too hard to guess.
yes, my point was that:
1. HOP affects whole network; whereas
2. EMUs currently affect only Onehunga and Manukau Lines.
Given how #2 is a small part of rail patronage, and rail patronage is a small part of overall network, then I’d be somewhat sceptical to attribute much growth to EMUs just yet. Of course, once the main rail lines go electric and we start to see higher frequencies, and (heaven forbid) KiwiRail/AT sort out the slow travel-times on the EMUs then we might start to see the latter having a larger effect.
But personally, I’ve used PT more since HOP became available – and I was always a solid PT user. It just makes it so much easier … the convenience factor is huge.
It’s worth noting that the Western Line is up 19% which is greater than the group of southern lines combined which is significant because there has been no peak frequency change since about 2008 (slightly more capacity from longer trains though) and the only notable change since 2010 has been the introduction of better services on weekends.
Personally the extension of the monthly pass to the region has made it heaps easier for meant getting to work than it would have been pre HOP, it costs me the same to get to Takapuna as it does for me to get to the city where as if I was working there pre hop (which I wasn’t) it would have required a separate fare/pass.
P.s. Yes there’s definitely huge latent, unmet demand for PT in Auckland; that’s why simple but effective improvements like HOP can stimulate large patronage response. Similar growth was observed in Brisbane when they implemented go card ways backs. Note that while rail has grown by 2 million journeys, not much of this is on lines that are currently affected by EMUs. Hence my scepticism that the latter has affected growth yet. I’m not doubting that it won’t, but that they will occur start to have a meaningful effect on patronage once south and west go live.
Stu,
We’ve had 1m more users of trains since early this year (March or so), i.e. we were 11m a year on about March and now we are 12 million a year.
The only *real* changes over that time has been EMUs being introduced onto 1 line then, for a few weeks recently, a second line, and the phase out of the old paper monthly passes and new HOP based ones being phased in. And also since July HOP prices were kept the same while cash prices went up and aligning of train fares with bus fares too was done.
As I recall the complaints were that the HOP monthly passes when introduced were either mostly the same or in some case inferior to, the old paper monthly passes, so that change to HOP monthly passes can’t explain that jump by 1m as its not a new service or even a expanded offering. And ferries which are the only addition to the HOP mix are actually showing static or declining usage over this time.
So what is driving the growth?
I note that the Western line is also running ahead too – at 19% – in “3rd” place – behind Eastern and Onehunga lines, without any major changes in frequency or trains in use there too. So people are obviously just using the trains more.
We’ve had Panmure station opening and Manukau campus opening recently to drive uptake on the Eastern Line. But nothing of note on the Onehunga line on its own aside just EMUs, with a large capacity.
And its showing a 30%+ growth.
All up HOP is part of the growth, but the recent growth doesn’t seem to tally with anything obvious that could be pinned directly to HOP or a combination of HOP related things.
Thats what is puzzling in all this. We’re seeing a sparks effect without too much sparks being applied.
I think you are underesrimating hops contribution. It not only makes it easier to use pt, but has also reduced boarding times across bus network as fewer people pay with cash. As hop uptake increases and boarding/dwell times reduce, buses will run faster/more reliably. Finally as matt notes hop makes it easier to get monthly passes and auto topup.
I’d agree with that explanation if HOP uptake for buses (as compared to single journey/paper ticket sales), was racing ahead. Its not, its been fairly static for most of the last year.
Agree that on buses, HOP will reduce loading (and thus dwell) times and that its a good thing.
But given the recent price changes for cash fares over HOP fares you’d expect HOP usage on buses and trains to be ramping up a lot. It isn’t.
The Stats report for September (figure 8) shows HOP usage by type for rail (presumably Bus HOP usage is still sensitive information).
It shows though there is a constant hard core of paper single usage of about 200K to 300K every month this year which matches same month in 2013 pretty much identically – the trend for paper singles in 2014 is slightly down over the last 6 months, but not by much. Still about 20% of the rail tickets are paper ones.
The rest of ticket type is a combination of HOP (the majority), and HOP monthly passes with a small portion of other types – these 3 track the patronage ups and downs over the last 6 months.As you’d expect, if you’re not using paper tickets you have to have a HOP card. And if you want any kind of monthly pass since March you need a HOP for that.
But from that graph it looks like HOP monthly usage since March is similar to paper monthly passes (as a portion) – the balance is mostly as you’d expect HOP usage.
While HOP usage (as compared to last year) is higher than it was in 2013, Patronage is too. And both HOP and HOP monthly pass tickets have pretty much had a fairly flat trend since March this year (may be slightly up but not by very much). Whereas patronage is up and up.
Agree HOP does something – my gut feel for rail patronage numbers tells me that HOP and monthly passes is enabling some, but not all, or even the majority, of the rail patronage uptick of late.
With buses you’d expect now all buses take HOP that its patronage would be racing ahead – the fact its not indicates probably service supply constraints than demand constraints.
And mode switching ala Panmure will explain only a fraction of the increase in rail patronage.
[about 10% at best of the 1m growth since March can be attributed to Panmure mode switching alone – assuming all the additional Panmure usage increase this year is people using buses as well to complete their journey – so there is about 100K worth of “journey” double counting]
Yes, both PT use and city living in AKL are currently suppressed through government policy which privileges auto dependent suburbia at the end of the motorway…..
I agree Stu. HOP has made the process of not only using PT easier but vastly simplified the ability to use a multitude of different services. Would we be seeing mass transfers between Eastern buses and rail at Panmure without HOP? Nope.
Bryce – I would agree that yes HOP enables these operator and mode transfers to occur and its early days yet still – but it comes with a financial penalty still even if the 50 cents transfer credit is included).
[And to be honest any half decent multi-modal/multi-operator PT system worth a damn would have this type of capability years ago – if ARTA/ARC had been allowed to do so as planned, we would have had it too]
However, that said, these growth in switching at Panmure numbers alone aren’t explaining all the sparks effect on Manukau (or Onehunga) lines yet.
So you have to assume that the volumes switching at Panmure (which there are) are mainly those who have worked out that switching at Panmure saves them time (even if not any money) over “being stuck in traffic”.the whole route between Britomart and Panmure on a bus (which has little bus priority for most of the route to the city), whereas the train will get them there in 17 minutes – **no matter the conditions on the roads**.
Something the bus could never hop to achieve without a full bus lane the whole way.
And this switch could not have happened before then as easily as the buses never properly stopped there/near the station to enable the switching to take place. And before that the station was in the wrong place.
Its great that HOP enables it though, and HOP has a big part to play, Its just not actually playing its full part yet (some would say that HOP has only shuffled the mode deck at this point) and AT has many more trump cards in its HOP “hand” to play – it is really dragging its heels on playing them though. PTOM discussions and contract negotiations may be the main reason why its not here yet.
One thing our stats are missing though is PT distance (in Km) travelled by mode (average or total doesn’t matter),
if we were seeing vast numbers making multi-modal journeys courtesy of HOP then we’d see the overall trip KM being flat even as PT trips rocketed.
And this is a statistic which was highlighted as needed earlier in the week. Wellington does this
Of course AT knows this very information right now. and could release it and the number of multi-modal journeys with numbers for each mod used right now if they chose.
Interesting numbers. Looking at rail, if we are a bit pessimistic and say the current growth will flatten out to 13.4% year on year (the lowest YTD growth rate of the various lines), then from our current 12M figure, it will take 4 years and a month to get to 20M – lets say by the end of November 2018. If we are more optimistic and say growth will hold at around 20%, then it will take about 2 years and 10 months to get to 20M, lets say by the end of August 2017.
Nick you’re right wit hthose numbers. We could in theory hit 20m well before 2021.
But there is a big problem looming later next year – thats when they predict Britomart (BM) will max out with regards train movements in and out of it via the tunnel 2 line bottleneck.
I gather Newmarket is not far behind with its own bottleneck too either.
Already that BM bottlenecking happens now – I got a train to BM on the Eastern line Friday AM – had to wait outside BM (near Quay St EMU stabling area) for a few minutes for another train (Onehunga line, as it was an EMU) to enter BM ahead of it, then the train got held up in the tunnel outside B as well and it got passed by at least one train outbound from BM while waiting to enter BM station, so the BM in/out lines are pretty busy now. Let alone next year when the first of the new network is up and running and full EMUs are in place.
So, the only fix for that as a short term measure is to make each train longer (6 car EMU versus 3 car EMU) – to deliver more people using the same number of in/out movements. In theory this will deliver at least a 30% of so improvement to most lines, some like Manukau would see a massive jump (400%) in capacity with 6 car EMUs over the old 2 car ADKs they replaced. Other lines like Western and Southern are using SA sets now – not so much of a boost with 6 car sets over the current capacity is available there.
And thats merely a delaying tactic, as after thats done the only fix then is to simply build CRL (or start running trains that avoid BM altogether). right now we don’t have enough EMUs ordered for 6 car operation on all services. I think the consensus was we are about 20 or so short of EMUs to do that. Even so the 57 we will get are a big step up from what was originally planned which is a good outcome.
So any patronage growth figures that rely on a simple linear growth pattern delivered by putting more trains on the same lines will max out well before 20m is reached thanks to BM.
.
The Govt – MoT, NZTA etc – courtesy of its advisors – knows all this full well.
Thats why the Govt can make these patronage target hurdles high enough (20m) and know that they’ll not be reached any time soon.
The real danger is not the low growth rail patronage model, but more the current high to extreme growth model in rail patronage – as that level of growth, will only bring the crowded trains crisis the EMUs are supposed to cure back to a head much sooner, but the options for relief when it does will be much less – and will take longer to deliver to fixes needed. So the longer the equivocation on CRL funding and thus a start date is ongoing, the worse the medium term outcome could become.
And you just know when that problem comes to the surface the Governments fix will be simply “more roads” just as it is now.
Of course by then Waterview will be open so the reduction in congestion being assumed that that “completion project” will deliver will not materialise, (or worse, the motorway congestion will really step up a gear thanks to induced demand) then the Government will have to raid even more future budgets for even more money to fix up the motorways further – and all to try and ease the congestion that the last lot of motorway spending just caused. Which means CRL will be starved of money even if it was reaching its targets for patronage growth.
What would the extension past Britomart to Albert St do for train congestion if it was completed by 2016?
Anything?
I don’t know, but from what I’ve read I think the main thing these tunnels allow “preloading” Britomart with trains before the peak, or for storing trains during peak to be let out post-peak.
I’m not sure how many trains you could “stuff up” the CRL tunnels. But it would be probably about half a dozen 3 car sets (3 on each track) if the tunnel went part way up Albert St proper. If further, then maybe another 2?
Which represents some 12-14 train movements (6 in/6 out) at peak. So thats about 1/3rd to 1/4 of the maximum possible movements in any given hour, or a 33% boost. at best for a single hour, or half that over a 2 hour peak.
Not sure if you could drive the trains into the tunnels as 6 car sets, then split them into 2, 3 car sets to allow twice the “outward” journeys compared to inward.
But all thats doing is changing the mix on in/out from 50/50 an hour to more out than in (or more in than out) depending on which peak it is (PM or AM). Not allowing more trains per hour.
Greg the CRL ‘early works’ or stage one goes as far as Wyndamn St. So guessing maybe as many as 3 six car sets on each track…..? Quite handy.
Depending on how it’s delivered, it could allow you to bring in trains during the morning peak that you don’t need to send out again to clear the platform. Not sending it out means you can bring in another instead.
Roughly that means you can run extra peak *direction* trains equal to half the number you can store in the tunnel. My guess is you could add maybe four-six trains extra in during the morning peak, and send those four-six out again in the afternoon.
The value of this without having extra fleet might be minimal, I.e. You can run more shorter trains instead of fewer longer ones. But if your goal is to boost frequency, rather than capacity, or add in new terminators (say a Hamilton run or two) it could be handy.
But anyway, this is all more or less free if you are building the tunnel anyway, so why not.
Ahead of Wellington’s patronage. And that’s with predominantly clapped out old deisels. What would patronage levels be like if we had a fully developed network?
Are there any figures for percentage of population? Maybe compare Ak to Wgtn to Sydney to Singapore?
Closest is trips per person (total trips over a year / total population).
As Matt said above for Auckland:
“One little milestone that did occur is that per capita we crossed 48 trips per person which is the first time that’s happened since 1989.”
Which is low by Wellington or other metropolitan centres, but at least its going up. From memory Wellington is in the high tens (just under 100 trips per person per year if I recall right). And in Australia its more like 140+ trips per person per year.
So we have a way to go to catch up.
Wellington is just over 70. Brisbane and Perth are in the 70-90 range. Mid sized Canadian cities are in the 90-110 range
Does anyone know where I can catch the train on the Northshore?
The Northshore represents around 25% of Auckland and there are no trains
How can trains be a viable solution for Auckland when there are no tracks to 25% of the population?