I have resisted entering this debate......until now.
Point1 : The heavy rail vs light rail debate was covered extensively in the trams forum maybe 18 months.....pages and pages and pages discussing the
same arguments. I was so tempted to copy and paste previous posts because of the "groundhog day" nature of the debate.
Point 2 : Why rebuid a functioning rapid rail line (the Outer Harbor line) without extrememly good reason? My guess a light rail conversion plus
Grange/West Lakes/Semaphore trams would cost $600-$800 million (?) At this point in time there is no money (or will from the Liberal
Government) to even do a simple electrification of the line. ($160 million?)
Point 3 : Patronage of the Outer Harbor line, low at the moment, what can be done? Well that's kinda obvious, decrease the number of stations speeding
up the line, rebuild a fair number of stations to increase "attractiveness" of the line and increase development around the existing stations.
Bowden Tod is well under way, hopefully initiating futher development around Kilkenny (this site has huge population potential) Woodville, Port
Adelaide, Port Dock and maybe futher up the Le Fevre peninsula.
Point 4 : The issue of trams/light rail entering the CBD.......Bowden to Adelaide station is 5 minutes (according to train timetable) the tram from the
Entertainment Centre to Adelaide Station is 11 minutes ( but traffic constantly makes this slower) In fact the DPTI report into the intial proposal in
2009 of converting Outer Harbor to light rail pointed out that the travel times from further out would be slower than the current heavy rail.
From the DPTI report.....
Option 1 = all tram lines to Outer Harbor/Grange/West Lakes
Option 2 = electrification of current heavy rail
Option 3/4 + tram down Grange Road to Grange and/or West Lakes
0= same travel time +2 = much faster travel time -2 +slower travel time or not applicable
Unfortunately I can no longer find this document on the DPTI website ( I down loaded it to my computer years ago)
PortLINK
Multi-Criteria Analysis Detail Report
PortLINK is the most difficult route to compare due to the range of options and the inclusion of the existing heavy rail corridor. The various options also provide access from a range of origins. For the travel time summary, each option has been assessed for the following five origins: Outer Harbour, Port Adelaide, West Lakes Interchange, Grange and Semaphore. Not all options have links from all five of these origins and arrival points in the city from each of these origins also vary. These arrival points are Adelaide Railway Station (heavy rail), ARS tram stop (on North Terrace outside the Railway Station) and a potential future tram stop on King William Road north of North Terrace. All Options were scored for each of the five origins and the overall score for the Option was derived as an average of these. If an origin is not served, the Option is awarded the lowest (-2) score.
Peak hour assessment shows that no Option provides improved travel times for all origins. The scale of travel time savings achieved via electrification of heavy rail on the existing rail lines, Option 2 is awarded the best overall scores despite not delivering services from two of the five origins. Option 1 provides the best overall service delivery (access to all origins by rail transport), closely followed by Option 3. Corridor Option Port Adelaide Outer Harbour Grange West Lakes Semaphore MCA Score
PortLINK 1
Peak
0
-1
-1
2
0
0
PortLINK 2
Peak
2
1
2
-2
-2
1
PortLINK 3
Peak
-2
-1
-2
1
-1
-1
PortLINK 4
Peak
0
-1
-2
0
-2
-1
And now back to reality land...is the Grange train line about to get the chop?
The crrent SA government want to cut low patronage bus and train services so is Grange in danger?