[VIS] Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

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TorrensSA
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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#46 Post by TorrensSA » Tue Jul 13, 2021 2:17 pm

The District Council of Mount Barker will hit 55,000 it's already close to 40,000, an area that extends from Bull Creek to Harrogate. Half of the population is in Mount Barker, the rest spread throughout the council area. A train will only service 35,000 in the District Council of Mount Barker and that's in 15 years. The issue is with the freeway, not a pie in the sky train. To put it in perspective, Two Wells, Buckland Park and Virginia will have 40,000 people in 30 years, if you made a spur line from Dry Creek to Two Wells, that would cover a population of 75,000 people in 30 years with current planned developments, but if you made it a transport corridor that could easily be 125,000+ people, it would cost a fraction of the price of a new / upgraded Mount Barker line, which would serve 15,000 in the Crafers to Bridgewater corridor and 35,000 in DC Mount Barker (total 50,000 people). I understand Mount Barker needs a solution but it's road based not rail based

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#47 Post by Spotto » Tue Jul 13, 2021 3:29 pm

TorrensSA wrote:
Tue Jul 13, 2021 2:17 pm
The District Council of Mount Barker will hit 55,000 it's already close to 40,000, an area that extends from Bull Creek to Harrogate. Half of the population is in Mount Barker, the rest spread throughout the council area. A train will only service 35,000 in the District Council of Mount Barker and that's in 15 years. The issue is with the freeway, not a pie in the sky train. To put it in perspective, Two Wells, Buckland Park and Virginia will have 40,000 people in 30 years, if you made a spur line from Dry Creek to Two Wells, that would cover a population of 75,000 people in 30 years with current planned developments, but if you made it a transport corridor that could easily be 125,000+ people, it would cost a fraction of the price of a new / upgraded Mount Barker line, which would serve 15,000 in the Crafers to Bridgewater corridor and 35,000 in DC Mount Barker (total 50,000 people). I understand Mount Barker needs a solution but it's road based not rail based
The train lines in suburban Adelaide don't magically service every single person living the council areas they pass through. The Seaford Line passes through Onkaparinga Council, but it's unlikely you'll see hordes of people from Morphett Vale or Reynella use it. Playford Council stretches as far east as One Tree Hill, do you think that they would ever use the Gawler Line? People who can use the train use the train, people who can't use buses or cars. The point is that by having a train, you don't have 100% of people relying on buses or cars.

This is not a "one or the other" scenario, the solution is both road and rail working together. A train might only service a portion of journeys to/from from Mount Barker DC, but by moving those people out of their cars and onto a train you free up capacity on the freeway that is now available to people from outer areas who do not have the train as an option for whatever journey they might be taking. And by also moving people from buses to trains, you create more space on said buses for new passengers or can redeploy the buses onto other local routes or act as feeder services for the train. A train won't mean that all buses on the freeway will be scrapped, there will still be buses that use the freeway, but where possible you can shift people's reliance on cars and buses to more sustainable alternatives.

You can't just keep using exclusively road-based solutions, creating more demand for people to use the road, then wonder why the problem still isn't solved. Likewise, you can't just say a train alone will solve everything and disregard making any improvements to the freeway. Cars, buses and trains working together will provide the best solutions.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#48 Post by Bob » Wed Jul 14, 2021 3:14 pm

This may have an impact directly related to this topic.

ARTC have submitted a request to Infrastructure SA for review. Do we read between the lines that ARTC don't see any short-medium term solution to a different route (i.e they don't see either a new north rail bypass or new south rail bypass as being realistic anytime soon)? Document released recently - link attached. Making the existing line double stacking proof would extend its life for the foreseeable future, this is an opposing view of the State Liberal Party wanting to bypass Adelaide on the main Mel-Per line, bit of a test for I-SA to see how independent they really are? Wonder what ARTC views are on sharing the line with a potential local passenger service, if the line is here to stay?

In addition, one further initiative relating to Melbourne to Adelaide Freight
Rail Improvements has been included on the basis of a submission from the
Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC)
. Quote on p11

Melbourne to Adelaide Freight Rail Improvements – Potential options to
address the initiative include removing or adjusting structures that impact
clearance to enable double stacking of containers. The proponent of this
initiative is the ARTC
. Quote on p29.

https://www.infrastructure.sa.gov.au/ou ... S-2021.pdf

Edit 20/07 - added IA link which provides more detail on this

https://www.infrastructureaustralia.gov ... provements
Last edited by Bob on Tue Jul 20, 2021 9:55 am, edited 1 time in total.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#49 Post by Nort » Thu Jul 15, 2021 9:29 am

Spotto wrote:
Tue Jul 13, 2021 3:29 pm
Playford Council stretches as far east as One Tree Hill, do you think that they would ever use the Gawler Line?
Yup. Have known multiple people who lived in One Tree Hill and used the Gawler train line to get in and out of Adelaide.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#50 Post by SBD » Thu Jul 15, 2021 6:57 pm

Nort wrote:
Thu Jul 15, 2021 9:29 am
Spotto wrote:
Tue Jul 13, 2021 3:29 pm
Playford Council stretches as far east as One Tree Hill, do you think that they would ever use the Gawler Line?
Yup. Have known multiple people who lived in One Tree Hill and used the Gawler train line to get in and out of Adelaide.
Buckland Park is also in Playford, so by that argument, we can stop carrying on about needing metro passenger rail on the Port Augusta line too.

Since this is about Mount Barker, I'd expect most of the people who use the bus park-and-ride to switch if a train was available, so surveying them would tell someone how far people come.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#51 Post by Nort » Fri Jul 16, 2021 5:35 pm

SBD wrote:
Thu Jul 15, 2021 6:57 pm
Nort wrote:
Thu Jul 15, 2021 9:29 am
Spotto wrote:
Tue Jul 13, 2021 3:29 pm
Playford Council stretches as far east as One Tree Hill, do you think that they would ever use the Gawler Line?
Yup. Have known multiple people who lived in One Tree Hill and used the Gawler train line to get in and out of Adelaide.
Buckland Park is also in Playford, so by that argument, we can stop carrying on about needing metro passenger rail on the Port Augusta line too.

Since this is about Mount Barker, I'd expect most of the people who use the bus park-and-ride to switch if a train was available, so surveying them would tell someone how far people come.
What argument? A simple question was asked and answered.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#52 Post by SBD » Fri Jul 16, 2021 6:25 pm

Nort wrote:
Fri Jul 16, 2021 5:35 pm
SBD wrote:
Thu Jul 15, 2021 6:57 pm
Nort wrote:
Thu Jul 15, 2021 9:29 am


Yup. Have known multiple people who lived in One Tree Hill and used the Gawler train line to get in and out of Adelaide.
Buckland Park is also in Playford, so by that argument, we can stop carrying on about needing metro passenger rail on the Port Augusta line too.

Since this is about Mount Barker, I'd expect most of the people who use the bus park-and-ride to switch if a train was available, so surveying them would tell someone how far people come.
What argument? A simple question was asked and answered.
There are six railway stations on the Gawler line in the City of Playford. In the conversation above, someone said that a station in Mount Barker would not serve the entire council district, and used Playford as an example. You responded that people from the eastern side of Playford use the Gawler line. Buckland Park is in the west of Playford, so some people might choose to drive to the railway, the same as from One Tree Hill.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#53 Post by Furyan » Sat Jul 17, 2021 4:39 pm

[Shuz] wrote:
Fri Jul 09, 2021 5:21 pm
marbles wrote:
Fri Jul 09, 2021 8:06 am
we basically need a tunnel from torrens park/brownhill creek up to stirling/crafers and bypass all the blackwood crap lol

Untitled.png
As simple as it is to draw lines on a map, as stated previously, trains need a gradient of 1 in 40 to travel safely at a decent speed. Sure, the gradient can be steeper, but then your maximum climb speed would slow down proportionally. So for every 1m of height up or down, you need 40 metres of track.

The distance between Mitcham and Stirling is roughly about 10 kilometres. That only gets you about 250m in height.

Torrens Park is roughly about 115m above sea level. Stirling is roughly 490m above sea level. That's 375m difference. A straight line tunnel would still fall short by 125m in height...

A ten kilometre train tunnel, no stations, would amount to at minimum $5b to build.
Sydney's driverless trains which operate in their Hills District can climb a steepest gradient of 4.5 percent (1 in 22) up or down.
Source : Sydney's Super Tunnel (2020) Episode 1 at about 30 min mark.

A tunnel from Mitcham Station to an underground Stirling station would only have a grade of about 3.5 percent (1 in 28).

Elevation - Mitcham 75m Stirling 500m
Distance - 12km using the Sheoak Road alignment (Willa-Willa Ridge)
Grade Calculated - 3.54 percent

The question would be what is the duty cycle of that 4.5 percent grade and whether 3.5 percent required is achievable?

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#54 Post by Bob » Fri Jul 23, 2021 1:14 pm

Furyan wrote:
Sat Jul 17, 2021 4:39 pm
[Shuz] wrote:
Fri Jul 09, 2021 5:21 pm
marbles wrote:
Fri Jul 09, 2021 8:06 am
we basically need a tunnel from torrens park/brownhill creek up to stirling/crafers and bypass all the blackwood crap lol

Untitled.png
As simple as it is to draw lines on a map, as stated previously, trains need a gradient of 1 in 40 to travel safely at a decent speed. Sure, the gradient can be steeper, but then your maximum climb speed would slow down proportionally. So for every 1m of height up or down, you need 40 metres of track.

The distance between Mitcham and Stirling is roughly about 10 kilometres. That only gets you about 250m in height.

Torrens Park is roughly about 115m above sea level. Stirling is roughly 490m above sea level. That's 375m difference. A straight line tunnel would still fall short by 125m in height...

A ten kilometre train tunnel, no stations, would amount to at minimum $5b to build.
Sydney's driverless trains which operate in their Hills District can climb a steepest gradient of 4.5 percent (1 in 22) up or down.
Source : Sydney's Super Tunnel (2020) Episode 1 at about 30 min mark.

A tunnel from Mitcham Station to an underground Stirling station would only have a grade of about 3.5 percent (1 in 28).

Elevation - Mitcham 75m Stirling 500m
Distance - 12km using the Sheoak Road alignment (Willa-Willa Ridge)
Grade Calculated - 3.54 percent

The question would be what is the duty cycle of that 4.5 percent grade and whether 3.5 percent required is achievable?
The challenge is $$$, there are so many metro rail items to be reviewed on the agenda and without listing them all again ( I posted them recently), just imagine if it came down to few billion $$$ to build the city link or a brand new rail line through the hills, the former would get the $$$ funding first, and that is just one example of many. SA probably needs at least $10B funding to do the current items on the list for the broader network, $$$ it simply does not have, and would have to be sourced over an extended period of a decade or two. Its going to be tough going for a long time to come.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#55 Post by 1NEEDS2POST » Fri Jul 30, 2021 6:38 am

Currently, trains that would need two locomotives on other routes need three locomotives to climb the hills. Allowing double stacking on the existing route doesn't change the fact the route needs more locomotives than a flatter route.

Passenger trains have a higher power to weight ratio, so this is never a problem for them. If a goods train bypass gets built, passenger trains could still use the existing alignment. With no goods trains on the railway, there are less scheduling problems, which is especially a problem where it's single track.
Bob wrote:
Tue Jul 13, 2021 10:17 am
BTW - I still think the aim to start the exercise should be asking the question how a one-hour rail journey from Mt Barker to ARS on the current line can be implemented, what would need to be done and at what cost – if the review came back and said not possible from an engineering point of view even with any rail corridor modifications/upgrades to meet that sort of schedule, then these other options certainly could come into play.
In 1975 SAR studied improvements to the existing alignment that would allow 160 km/h running over most of the route to Monarto and higher (although not 160 km/h) to Mount Barker. In summary, with upgrades to the existing route, ARS to Mount Barker Junction non-stop looks like it would take 25 minutes with these upgrades (I'm approximating with 50 km at 120 km/h). You can read a summary of the proposed improvements on pages 46 to 50 (https://www.mitchamcouncil.sa.gov.au/__ ... Report.pdf). Unfortunately I can't find the original 1975 Peregrine Report, so does anyone know where to find it?

In addition to these improvements, if a hills bypass gets built for goods trains, they could increase the cant on the curves on the existing alignment to allow even faster passenger trains. If we use tilt trains, then we could go even faster.
Bob wrote:
Wed Jul 14, 2021 3:14 pm
https://www.infrastructure.sa.gov.au/ou ... S-2021.pdf

Edit 20/07 - added IA link which provides more detail on this

https://www.infrastructureaustralia.gov ... provements
Thank you for the links.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#56 Post by SouthAussie94 » Sat Jul 31, 2021 10:20 am

1NEEDS2POST wrote:
Fri Jul 30, 2021 6:38 am
In 1975 SAR studied improvements to the existing alignment that would allow 160 km/h running over most of the route to Monarto and higher (although not 160 km/h) to Mount Barker. In summary, with upgrades to the existing route, ARS to Mount Barker Junction non-stop looks like it would take 25 minutes with these upgrades (I'm approximating with 50 km at 120 km/h). You can read a summary of the proposed improvements on pages 46 to 50 https://www.mitchamcouncil.sa.gov.au/__ ... Report.pdf
Unfortunately I can't find the original 1975 Peregrine Report, so does anyone know where to find it?
These dot points are incredibly simplified and largely brush over just how major these works would be. Everything sounds easy when it's summarised in a 25 word dot point.

How much would it cost to bypass Sleeps Hill Tunnel and to then build a new cutting and viaduct over the valley?

How much would it cost to remove the Sheppard's Hill Tunnel and build new road bridges?

You close Coromandel Parade to traffic, therefore leaving just one way in and out of the Blackwood Park area. What then happens to the Blackwood Roundabout? What upgrades would be needed on the road network in this area?

This is the works that the "report" suggests take place on a relatively short portion on the line. How much would this cost? Hove Crossing was forecast to cost $170million so extrapolating from this these upgrades would cost $400million? $800million? More? Again, extrapolate this over the whole corridor and you are still looking at billions of dollars.

Is a train to Mt Barker the best use of billions of dollars? What other rail upgrades could occur for this price?

It's a pie in the sky idea from a world where money isn't an object.
"All we are is bags of bones pushing against a self imposed tide. Just be content with staying alive"

Views and opinions expressed are my own and don't necessarily reflect the views or opinions of any organisation of which I have an affiliation

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#57 Post by Nort » Wed Oct 13, 2021 11:33 am

This is back in the news today, with the transport minister saying he's going to get a more detailed breakdown of the cost predictions.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#58 Post by Waewick » Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:38 pm

We absolutely need more rail in this state ( and better)

But surely, when you move to somewhere with Mount in it, you might understand why no one is in a rush to built it to you.

Express buses surely are the better option here?

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#59 Post by Nort » Fri Oct 15, 2021 1:48 pm

Waewick wrote:
Thu Oct 14, 2021 8:38 pm
We absolutely need more rail in this state ( and better)

But surely, when you move to somewhere with Mount in it, you might understand why no one is in a rush to built it to you.

Express buses surely are the better option here?

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Express Buses would also be bottle-necked by the freeway and traffic getting into the city.

When people moved up to that area because it was a cheaper option I agree it's not unreasonable to say "Well this is one of the reasons it was a cheaper option..." but at the same time we're talking about a region that already had rail and that is still seeing expansion. If it hadn't been shut in the 80's it would likely be quite a popular line now.

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[VIS] Re: Passenger Trains to Mount Barker

#60 Post by marbles » Sun Oct 17, 2021 11:28 am

trains sure but the track has gotta go direct somehow from crafers to adelaide, no left turns to blackwood/belair etc

the freeway traffic needs a right turn heading north freeway say from callington that goes north a meets up to grand juction road or something. trucks shouldnt even go near glen osmond/city/portrush road

mount barker in itself the infrastructure is a joke. estates being built everywhere, 1000s moving in but no plans for outer freeways direct to the main freeway, some little hysen boulevard which is barely 1km long and thats about it

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