Memorandum submitted by CTC the National
Cyclists Organisation (LR 88)
INTEGRATED TRANSPORT: THE FUTURE OF LIGHT
RAIL AND MODERN TRAMS IN BRITAIN
Before answering the specific points raised
by the Committee, we would note the following addition matters
where light rail and tram systems have had an impact on the amenity
and safety of CTC members and other cycle users generally diminishing
their ability to make journeys available prior to the implementation
of the scheme. Key points are as follows:
(1) The introduction of new on street tramway
systems has an obvious impact on the cyclist with the rails in
the road surface, a prominent hazard which has killed and injured
even in the short period of operation of some modern systems.
Nottingham reported falls before their system was even operating.
The incidents are often clustered around specific points—Sheffield
has 2-3 such locations—and the reporting of injury and incidents
has in several instances slipped from the official statistics,
because the Police under-reporting of single vehicle injury crashes
is well known, and additionally the grey area of reporting a crash
on the tram track and highway surface 18" either side, which
technically can be argued to be a tram track and not the adopted
highway, thus in theory the Railway Inspectorate or current equivalent
should be receiving reports and, where appropriate, carrying out
formal inquiries into serious or repeated incidents. The profile
of this issue was made prominent by the case of a motorist rather
than the more common victim—the 2 wheel road user—in
the case of Roe vs Sheffield Supertram & others. We comment
later on the detail of rails embedded in the carriageway and their
installation & maintenance.
(2) The replacement of former rail services—which
carried bicycles, with tram and metro systems (Croydon, Manchester,
Newcastle, Birmingham, and to a lesser extent Nottingham) has
seriously eroded the transport choices and raised social exclusion
issues as well as removing a whole market sector from the potential
passenger base. The UK systems stand out from those overseas in
that carriage of bicycles is generally the accepted practice elsewhere,
with the occasional exception, or restriction of access times,
here, to date, no light rail or tram system has officially carried
bicycles, although work has taken place with CTC and local cycle
lobby groups to survey the potential and (Sheffield) demonstrate
with a full-size cardboard bicycle template and passenger reaction
survey on a Sunday service. Where figures are known, an indication
is that 2-4% of passengers will travel with a bike, and possibly
greater numbers ride to & from stations.
A case of damaging their own operation has ironically
occurred with the extension of the Nexus Metro system to Sunderland,
as the train crew, working shifts, found the combination of bike
and train (using the pre-Metro train services) an ideal means
of getting to the depot, when otherwise they would need to travel
at times when a car or motorcycle is the most effective alternative,
thus the new operation has created a need for car parking and
its larger demand on space at the Metro depot than the old regime
of staff taking bikes in on the train.
THE COSTS
AND BENEFITS
OF LIGHT
RAIL
The general comparison between "tram"
systems and the guided bus alternative is often quoted in terms
of the tram costing between 2 & 3 times more than the guided
bus to construct and commission, and tram systems have a long
gestation period, before the service starts due to the massive
disruption and the need to complete the whole line before a service
can start. Once started the service often will spend a long period
requiring subsidy to maintain the infrastructure, and that infrastructure
has to be completed for the entire route before services can begin
to run.
This question has an interesting case study
of an alternative of guided bus operation in the Gatwick-Crawley
Fastway system, which provides the equivalent of a tram route
between Crawley and Gatwick Airport which was described in detail
in a paper delivered by Councillor Col, Tex Pemberton, the W Sussex
Cabinet Member for Transport—details are carried on www.fastway.com
This system was moved from concept to operation in under 5 years,
and cost £35 million—compared to an estimated £350m
for an equivalent tram route. It has started running before all
the sections of dedicated route are in place, and can extend routes
to diverse starting points using the existing roads infrastructure.
The operation is fully commercial and expanding—it now has
10 minute peak frequency and a minimum level of 30 minute frequency
over 24 hour running 7 days/week. The Commercial operators move
to Overground and other core route development mirrors this approach.
WHAT LIGHT
RAIL SYSTEMS
NEED TO
BE SUCCESSFUL
A light rail system which is a reduced heavy
rail system which can handle tighter curves and steeper gradients
will cost less to construct and operate. Frequently the light
rail systems in Europe use a 1 metre gauge track in place of the
1.435m standard gauge of heavy rail, which allows for cheaper
construction, especially for the rail lines themselves—typified
in the UK by the narrow gauge lines which penetrate deep into
the Welsh Mountains. This as we understand has not been a consideration
for UK systems, and we might ask why?, a narrow gauge track with
conventional width vehicles will put a broader gap between a boarding
platform and the inside rail, so that a cyclist is less pinched
where this arrangement occurs in a street-running situation as
delivered for the Nottingham, Sheffield, and Croydon networks.
In Manchester and Birmingham the platforms can be island platforms,
and the places where the cycle (and other vehicle) traffic passes
through a tram stop are rare. The high cost of platform systems
contrasts with many overseas operations where passengers can board
from the street, or any "platform" is little more than
a standard height footway.
In both Sheffield and Croydon, where the trams
run extensively on-street, the systems are not popular with cyclists
because the way that cycles are forced to cross tram tracks is
compromised, either by bad initial design or lack of road space,
the tram-track crashes are heavily clustered, a strong indication
that there are specific features of the track or tram operation
which produce the crashes (ie a crash black spot).
Manchester has less of a problem, as this system
uses the trams in a manner closer to the "correct" way
with fast limited stop running on reserved tracks (mostly old
rail lines), and only coming on-street for high density demand
in the very centre of the city, or satellite towns. This was very
much the style of operation for Glasgow's successful and intensive
network, with tram tracks running in the centre of the street
as they do in many locations, avoiding the kerb pinch problems,
but requiring a major discipline issue for other road users not
to pass a tram which is stopped to pick-up passengers.
However the track cross-profile in Manchester
is however appalling both in specification (surface finishes which
fail too easily and too wrong-side) and maintenance which fails
to hold this in check.
Light rail, as in the Newcastle Metro and to
a lesser extent the London Underground, is, in the UK generally
worked closer to the best practice option with well spaced stations,
and, when the regulated bus routes were co-ordinated with the
Metro station hubs, part-way to the goal. The missing element
being the integration with personal transport for the essential
element of the shoulder journey, connecting at the "front
door" of origin and destination, and the importance of good
permeability and connectivity for the consolidation of passengers
at stopping points is the key to making a system popular and useable.
Nexus Metro scores here too by diverting from the basic re-use
of a local rail network, to put station stops where people will
be travelling to & from a journey generator such as a shopping
centre, university or hospital. An example of the failure to do
this is at Watford, where the potential to connect the potential
to collect a substantial element of tens of thousands of trips
generated by a development is not being grasped.
Outside the major journey generation sites,
the ability to spread the catchment through providing direct routes
on foot and cycle, linking housing, low density commercial sites,
and more distant major sites to a station stop, is a notably absent
feature from systems which are underperforming. The bicycle has
a role to play here, especially for light rail, with stations
spaced too far apart to make them walkable for all potential customers,
and for tram systems where the routes move out to high speed reserved
track running outside town centres. In this respect the inverse
of UK practice seen overseas, where cycle carriage on the system
is commonplace, cycle parking at stops is secure, and planned
from the outset, and cycle access delivered as a ride-up and board
facility.
Cycle carriage does, we understand take place
illicitly on a number of UK systems, especially the Nexus Metro
HOW EFFECTIVELY
IS LIGHT
RAIL USED
AS PART
OF AN
INTEGRATED TRANSPORT
SYSTEM
In the UK we fail miserably in integrating light
rail networks with, the personal transport systems that deliver
the passenger—the ultimate unit of travel—door-to-door.
To achieve this the light rail system has to connect with a high
level of service to walking and cycling networks which fan out—dispersing
the high concentration of traffic which can be delivered from
a popular service, and serving all destinations with the most
direct routes that can be accommodated. This is seen widely in
Europe, and even in the re-born US systems, with generous and
well laid out pathways, and large cycle parks.
As noted the light rail system which runs like
a train with well spaced stations delivers the best benefits from
the concept, and the tram equally works to the light rail model
outside town centres and locations where passenger demand is densely
clustered. As noted we are failing to integrate with the bicycle
as a mode practically ideal for the shoulder journey distances
involved, and available to a far more socially inclusive group
than driving (most of the population can ride a bicycle including
those excluded by age or disability from driving), with a level
of service (individual and immediate) not offered by the bus.
The failure to achieve these details in integrating
the tram & light rail systems seriously detract from their
patronage.
BARRIERS TO
THE DEVELOPMENT
OF LIGHT
RAIL
The bad reputation from high cost schemes which
bodge a Light Rail network out of a disused rail line that no
longer goes to the right locations, and on-street running where
reserved track or a separate light rail network should have been
built has dogged UK development. A key example was the failure
to provide a direct and obvious connection from the Sheffield
Supertram to the rail station, which has only now been partially
addressed. The Sheffield system still has tram stops at Meadowhall,
University and the Midland Station which do not put information
on tram departures where their potential customers can use it.
This is a major failing for all UK public transport.
Trams should normally run in the centre of the
carriageway and not to the side, with island platforms or walk-out
provision which forces all other traffic to stop for passengers,
a positive move to encourage those travelling in the `other' traffic
to consider the tram as the mode to use. This will greatly improve
safety for cyclists and others at the nearside of the road
THE EFFECT
OF DIFFERENT
FINANCING ARRANGEMENTS
(PUBLIC/PRIVATE)
ON THE
OVERALL COST
OF LIGHT
RAIL SYSTEMS
We cannot comment specifically on the finance
mechanisms
THE PRACTICALITY
OF ALTERNATIVES
TO LIGHT
RAIL, SUCH
AS INCREASED
INVESTMENT IN
BUSES
Investment in the appropriate type of bus is
possibly more the issue rather than simply increased investment,
guided buses, running with hybrid power units, or as trolleybuses
in high density city centre sections used by several routes, and
using these small turbines (diesel or gas) or car-sized diesel
engines running through batteries. The Seattle system operating
since the mid 1980's with Breda dual powered buses making up 25%
of the 1,200 bus fleet, appeared almost seamless in the change-over
from diesel to wires through the city centre tunnel and on street.
Fastway is a clear demonstration of this, and other smaller scale
guided bus systems show that the scale of infrastructure does
not need to run to rails embedded in a road to generate the public
response.
Bikes can go on buses, and the demonstrator
vehicle from the German operation die Andere Bahn was demonstrated
in Chester & Cardiff last year. This vehicle runs as a "train"
and carries up to 7 bikes on a vehicle almost identical to the
typical London articulated bus (it is also a Mercedes Citaro).
Curitiba especially, in their decision to use high capacity guided
buses instead of trams (Volvo bus has a video available, which
we would ask to be considered by the committee), has established
an enviable network quickly and a lower cost. Bus systems which
do openly carry bikes report that between 2% and 4% of passengers
are travelling, and typically only 25% of that number are existing
passengers changing their travel pattern, and 25% are completely
new journeys (Portland OR report 1994). Buses can also be completely
flat floor accessible from road level or a raised platform when
used on a guided or dedicated busway system
SAFETY
The HSE RI spec for rail head levels relative
to abutting road surfaces is +0 to -6mm installed for all new
systems, a detail changed after representations from CTC and others
that the old specification left a potentially "high"
railhead which lifted the tyre and removed the spread of contact
patch to either side of the rail, in theory on less slippery road
surfaces. The tram operator is responsible under Tramways Act
for the road surfaces between the rails and 18 inches to either
side. In Europe, some operators have a very regular programme
to clean out the flangeways (to reduce the oil & crushed leaves
which collect there and greatly enhance the risks of slippery
rails) CTC believe that current operators should be asked about
their track housekeeping in this respect as this has a significant
influence on the image of the tram to other road users. If the
track infill is well maintained and the rails `clean' this speaks
well of the maintenance regime.
Dave Holladay
Transportation Management Solutions
March 2005
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