Melbourne Ring Rail?
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stui magpie 
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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| Post subject: Melbourne Ring Rail? |  |
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Who else reckons we should build a ring rail in Melbourne?
We have all the train lines heading out from the CBD like spokes emanating from an axle, but there's no rim on this wheel.
Build a ring rail that goes from the west, following the ring road, all the way to frankston, connect it to the outlying stations on the spokes so someone in Epping can get to Ringwood with one train trip.
Lunacy or genius?
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Bucks5 
Nicky D - Parting the red sea
Joined: 23 Mar 2002
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Wouldn't someone going from Preston to Seaford need to catch three trains instead of 2? ie. Preston to Epping, the ring train to Frankston, then one from Frankston to Seaford.
Would it be much of a time saver if you allowed an approx 10 minute wait between each change of trains? |
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David 
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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I don't think it's lunacy, I just think it would likely fail a cost/benefit analysis. I'd love to have a more grid-like Paris metro system, but I think an outer ring rail would do little to take us in that direction and I just don't think we have the infrastructure or political will for such a large project.
Now we're on the topic, though, what do people think of the new metro tunnel proposal? Good idea? Bad idea? And will it actually happen, or is it just destined to be another Rowville-line-style pipe dream?
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Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007
Location: Between London and Melbourne
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| David wrote: | I don't think it's lunacy, I just think it would likely fail a cost/benefit analysis. I'd love to have a more grid-like Paris metro system, but I think an outer ring rail would do little to take us in that direction and I just don't think we have the infrastructure or political will for such a large project.
Now we're on the topic, though, what do people think of the new metro tunnel proposal? Good idea? Bad idea? And will it actually happen, or is it just destined to be another Rowville-line-style pipe dream? |
Cost benefit analysis on projects of this type is probably not the right framework for evaluation. Government is not private business : there is no measurable revenue line, so the "benefit" is always going to be notional and impossible to measure, unless a phantom, largely imaginary set of numbers is magicked up. The question for government is whether, within a limited overall capital envelope, this is the best option. That requires a comparison of this vs the other options, such as a Tullamarine-City rail, and a Doncaster-City rail. I suspect these two would be a better use of public money, as things stand now. But developing a ring rail over the long term is probably desirable, so slowly and progressively accumulating the parcels of land which will provide the optionality to make it happen might well be worth consideration.
Rail is far preferable to motor cars if it can be made to work, and we should have a clear 30-year rail strategy, agreed by a cross party authority with the power to enact it within an overall capital budget. That, of course, is unlikely to happen given the limited, lack-brained vote-buyers who infest modern politics, most of whom would be intellectually challenged by hopscotch.
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stui magpie
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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| Quote: | | limited, lack-brained vote-buyers who infest modern politics, most of whom would be intellectually challenged by hopscotch. |
Truly great description.
I think you could do a cost benefit anaysis that would stand up, if you considered the cost of continually upgrading roads to deal with increasing traffic.
Melbourne is growing outward, more and more people are moving out for housing affordability and do not live near work. ergo, they need to travel.
The current rail setup assumes everyone travelling into the CBD and back which is no longer the case, many skirt the surrounds on increasingly choked roads.
My proposal would have the rains continue on the in and out lines, with a dedicated service running around the perimeter. If you needed to travel from Altona to greensborough, instead of driving, catching 2 trains or god forbid using a bus, you could jump on ring rail.
People from the northern suburbs who work east or west, could drive in to the train station then ring rail to work instead of 2 trains.
People travelling from the east to the airport could get ring rail rather than drive and pay parking, taxi or 2 trains.
Apart from the environmental impact of less cars on the road you have less infrastructure cost in upgrading roads and provide more incentive for business to relocate from the CBD to the suburbs.
I think it's a no brainer that won't happen because we don't have any politicians that far sighted.
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Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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| Mugwump wrote: | | we should have a clear 30-year rail strategy, agreed by a cross party authority with the power to enact it within an overall capital budget. |
This is an excellent idea. What would it take to implement such a thing?
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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Pies4shaw 
pies4shaw
Joined: 08 Oct 2007
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15 year fixed terms for government - long enough for them to be able to think about the medium term but no so long that they would have to go to an election facing up to the political consequences of the implementation of their 30-year plan.  |
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Pies4shaw
pies4shaw
Joined: 08 Oct 2007
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| David wrote: | I don't think it's lunacy, I just think it would likely fail a cost/benefit analysis. I'd love to have a more grid-like Paris metro system, but I think an outer ring rail would do little to take us in that direction and I just don't think we have the infrastructure or political will for such a large project.
Now we're on the topic, though, what do people think of the new metro tunnel proposal? Good idea? Bad idea? And will it actually happen, or is it just destined to be another Rowville-line-style pipe dream? |
They've already started constructing works in the CBD and they're aiming to tunnel under my neighbour shortly. I'm not that thrilled about them putting a train tunnel about 6 metres below (and slightly to the south of) where the Lambo gets parked but, hey, I'm not actually a NIMBY so my concern about the possibility of my house, my dogs, my Lambo, my Range Rover, my family and me falling into a hole in the ground is more than compensated for by the impotent expressions of hopeless rage emanating from next door. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003
Location: Andromeda
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^
I didn't actually realise it was already starting. That's kind of exciting to hear (even if it is going to take the better part of a decade to build the thing).
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All watched over by machines of loving grace |
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stui magpie
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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^
Look on the bright side, those early morning vibrations from the trains going underneath could open up a whole new world for you and the missus. 
_________________
Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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Pies4shaw
pies4shaw
Joined: 08 Oct 2007
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| David wrote: | ^
I didn't actually realise it was already starting. That's kind of exciting to hear (even if it is going to take the better part of a decade to build the thing). |
It's probably exciting for those of you who don't have a fair proportion of your worldly wealth invested in a piece of real estate that will be completely unsaleable for a decade because it's going to be in the middle of a war zone.
Still, happily its only a fair proportion of my worldly wealth, so I guess I can flip off to the Bellarine Peninsula and watch from there or - if the dust and smog from the works carry that far - head off to the penthouse apartment at Buchan Point, work (very) remotely and commute from there, as necessary.
On a serious note, though, there are a lot of ordinary working people (teachers, nurses, academics etc) who have bought property in that area in the expectation that selling it would provide for their retirement and this construction work has ruined their financial strategies for the last quarter of their lives. I don't need compensation, of course, and I wouldn't put my hand out but there are plenty of people living around me who will suffer extreme hardship - it's very interesting observing just how little account is taken of such matters in the Government's policy and planning.
I also have some serious reservations about whether you can build a train tunnel 4 metres below the foundations of a whole lot of buildings and infrastructure erected in the 19th and early 20th centuries and expect it to end well for all concerned. However, I expect the Government's loss-adjusters have done their calculations and concluded that paying out on the odd mangled family that gets sucked down unexpectedly, as they sleep, into the path of a moving train is a more financially-effective strategy than building the thing more appropriately in the first place. |
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Pies4shaw
pies4shaw
Joined: 08 Oct 2007
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| stui magpie wrote: | ^
Look on the bright side, those early morning vibrations from the trains going underneath could open up a whole new world for you and the missus. |
Mate, at our age, we'll probably just wake up every morning thinking it's the onset of Parkinson's. |
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stui magpie
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005
Location: In flagrante delicto
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| Pies4shaw wrote: | | stui magpie wrote: | ^
Look on the bright side, those early morning vibrations from the trains going underneath could open up a whole new world for you and the missus. |
Mate, at our age, we'll probably just wake up every morning thinking it's the onset of Parkinson's. |
handjob?
_________________
Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005
Location: somewhere
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Would be a great idea, as is the ring road, but just like the ring road they will **** it up! It won't be wide enough or finished, ever! The extra stations around here are great, shame they didn't think about parking! Every time I go past the new station in the middle of nowhere near Laverton, I wonder where the hell all those cars used to be! Overnight enough cars to fill the MCG quagmire suddenly app reared, they park everybloddywhere! Would have been fun getting out of there last night. No surprise that crash happened, I nearly got taken out there the other day, the way they are doing the road works (how many fricken times will they try and fix this before they get it right?) is terrifyingly bad. And now at least one person won't ever make it home again. I can't believe how many people forgot that when they bitched about how late they got home last night. Both my kids got stuck in it, but they got home in one piece thank god.
It's crazy, they keep building building building and the road systems just can't handle the traffic. A new train system is a great idea, but they need multilevel parking at the stations, and they need to make sure the roads around it can handle the traffic.
Don't get me started on those awful skinny lanes on the Westgate, that's an epic disaster waiting to happen.
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You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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swoop42 
Whatcha gonna do when he comes for you?
Joined: 02 Aug 2008
Location: The 18
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The ring rail sounds like a network of dogging locations across Melbourne.
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He's mad. He's bad. He's MaynHARD! |
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