Gold Coast Rapid Transit.

[noofnoof]

ahh, a project close to my heart.
http://www.goldcoastrapidtransit.com.au ... mation.php
^^
informative videos.

It's a project close to my heart because if it is succesful it might spell trams for Brisbane. However GC being the NIMBY central that it is will probably complain...
anyway the trams in the videos look like Citadis 302, but a more experienced tram spotter will correct me.

Discussion question

your thoughts? is it a good thing? have you ever had any negative tram experiences?

[Kevo00]

There's no doubt in my mind that trams are superior to buses for high density routes. However trams don't have great press in the UK at the moment - do a google search for 'Edinburgh Trams'. The project has to be well managed, delivered on time, and well designed to avoid annoying the Top Gear mentality.

[noofnoof]

This one has 70% seperated from roads, but it's tied up in 3 tiers of government. but they are oh so serious about it.

[Ameecher]

In fairness though, the building of the Edinburgh Tram system has been ridiculous.

[audigex]

Edinburgh really is awful, but Sheffield proves what can happen if it's done properly. Okay, it's not perfect but it beats the hell out of buses.

Same for manchester, the buses there can be bloody awful - but the trams are pretty good. Manchester just has the advantage of being so spread out for the size of city.

[orudge]

There's no doubt in my mind that trams are superior to buses for high density routes. However trams don't have great press in the UK at the moment - do a google search for 'Edinburgh Trams'. The project has to be well managed, delivered on time, and well designed to avoid annoying the Top Gear mentality.

I wouldn't really say it's the so-called "Top Gear mentality" that is the issue here, it's more the fact that the project really has been a very expensive shambles, at least so far. Plus all this in a city that already has probably the best public transport next to London. The end result should be good, however - it's just the fact it's costing so much money and resulting in such a huge amount of disruption that it's annoying people. A nice idea, but poor implementation. (Personally, if am in a strange city, I'd much prefer to get on a tram or a light rail line than a bus - because buses are very much unpredictable, whereas trams only have a set number of stops and it's usually much easier to see where you are!)

[JamieLei]

Best public transport next to London? I'd highly disagree with that! If anything I'd say that Birmingham is much better, since it has a very well used commuter rail network and a token tram line already.

I'm all for the Edinburgh tram project. There might be some pain while Princes Street is all dug up (I've been there while there's work in it) but people will appreciate it in the long run.

[Ameecher]

The problem is that Prince's Street has been closed on 3 seperate occasions in order to alter the services under the road, then to do track laying, it was then re-opened over christmas to be shut down again to complete the wiring now. A properly planned project wouldn't have planned the work over the main shopping period and would have tried to have caused minimum disruption.

[noofnoof]

(Personally, if am in a strange city, I'd much prefer to get on a tram or a light rail line than a bus - because buses are very much unpredictable, whereas trams only have a set number of stops and it's usually much easier to see where you are!)

genau.
I was happy catching trams and etwas in Germany, but a bus is not something I would do in a foreign city, which brings it back to one of the reasons for this one on the Gold Coast, the place being very touristy, the videos I posted above claiming 60'000 tourists staying there every night. but with the governments evil play to get everyone onto RFID ticketing (I've got one, and they're awesome, but not if you're a tourist here for less than a month).

[orudge]

Best public transport next to London? I'd highly disagree with that! If anything I'd say that Birmingham is much better, since it has a very well used commuter rail network and a token tram line already.

Well, at least in terms of buses - Edinburgh probably has one of most comprehensive, efficient and cheap bus networks in the country. Obviously, in terms of commuter rail and so on it isn't as good as other places - even Glasgow has a much larger rail network than Edinburgh, of course.

[Kevo00]

I agree with Owen actually, there's no doubt in my mind that Edinburgh has the best bus network outside London. Well planned, and well advertised, with simple fares (£1, or a well advertised day ticket) and clear route maps on the bus stops. Most UK provincial companies don't bother with that. As for the Birmingham trams, I've never been on them but my perception was they don't go anywhere useful much, in Birmingham at least.

[JamieLei]

Actually you'd be surprised with Birmingham. It had a huge improvement about 3 years ago when Centro finally decided to get its head out of the sand and create a uniform branding across the West Midlands region. There are day tickets that are valid on all bus operators, tickets for bus and train, or metro, or any combination. Smartcards are on the way and should be implimented by the end of the year. Intermodal travel is getting slowly better, and the maps on bus stops are not perfect but they're getting there. Real time bus info was introduced some years back, but over the last 9 months seems to have gone tits-up on quite a few major routes sadly.

Do open up the last PDF map of Cotteridge - it's almost as if they're trying to be TfL!

Cotteridge.pdf

(188.66 KiB) Downloaded 72 times

[61653]

...and clear route maps on the bus stops. Most UK provincial companies don't bother with that...

Of course, in most vaguely large towns and cities WorstGroup have branded key routes with a colour (Red Line, Blue Line, even Magenta Line)... but i'm pretty sure nobody in the country says "get on the Red Line bus" when giving directions. They'd just say "Get the 370" or more than likely, drive to the station to pick their guest up, thus adding to congestion. They'd be much more likely to say "get the Bury tram to Bowker Vale" cos the fixed tramway implies some degree of permanence and seems as if it would be more reliable, whether this is really the case or not.

[Ameecher]

Indeed, trams are much more trustworthy in that they don't really have much option to pee you off and go the opposite way to which you are hoping due to the fact the rails limit it. That's one irritating thing about my local bus operator, it operates the route 5 from the North Norfolk Coast to Norwich, runs every hour. Useful. Fantastic even for such a sparsely populated area. Trouble is, unless you are in the know the route has 3 variations and whilst that may not affect the end to end traveller people in the middle end up poo creek because they aren't number differently (an A, B & C suffix would probably do it but no...) and we have to suffer that awful set up that is Traveline East Anglia. The more I use it the more it irritates me.

[orudge]

Indeed, trams are much more trustworthy in that they don't really have much option to pee you off and go the opposite way to which you are hoping due to the fact the rails limit it.

Although... myself and some other guy were somewhat annoyed when arriving at Minneapolis Airport at about 11pm on a Sunday in January, as for whatever reason they'd swapped the directions of the trains around for that night - so the suburbs-bound train was actually the city-bound train, and we didn't realise that until after it had gone, and being Sunday night, the trains weren't going very often. But yes, generally they don't do that.

[audigex]

I'd ALWAYS take a tram over a bus in a strange city - for the very simple reason that I can look out of the window when it stops and know exactly where I am.

A Sheffield tram last weekend: Looked out of the window and see "Hillsborough", a quick glance up shows me that I'm 2 stops away.

Conversely a Manchester bus the weekend before, I only discovered I was next to Piccadily because I overheard someone saying "should we get off here for Piccadily, or head up to Oxford road?" to which their friend said "Here" and they got off - so I followed.

Buses are fine if you know where you're going, but they just don't have the same ease-of-use if you're a stranger to the city.

[Kevo00]

Quite true Audigex, I remember I once had to get on the Milan circular bus, and get off at the seventh stop! As I had no idea where I was, I was terrified that I would miscount them! Also the fact I had an argument with an old man over my bag, who insisted I shouldn't have taken a big bag on the bus, was distracting and made me nearly loose count!

Its always amazed me that bus companies don't attempt to raise patronage by investing in better passenger information, and always leave the installation of any such systems to local authorities. I guess thats the consequence of a system that still relies on public subsidy to survive, despite being theoretically fully deregulated.

[JamieLei]

To be fair, London Buses are bloody fantastic now. I was singing in the Royal Albert Hall, so I told my parents to cross the road and get the 9, 10 or 378 destined for Hammersmith and Willsden. The announcement "9! To Hammersmith! Royal Albert Hall!" (exclamation marks added since Digital Doris always sounds so surprised upon making each announcement) meant that they (who are notorious for getting lost, and oddly particularly vulnerable when using SatNav) found the place with no problem at all

Barcelona, London and Prague have automated announcements on buses - I'm surprised it isn't more widespread.

[XeryusTC]

Those announcements are great indeed, except from the fact that they're turned down quite A LOT in the busses I have when going to school, if you're having a conversation you will miss them no doubt. Fortunately most busses have screens displaying where they are currently and the upcoming stops. This is a very useful tool if you're in a unknown area, I used it a while ago in a city halfway across the country and found my stop without any trouble. The only problem with such a system is that the screens are down quite often apparently, especially on the older busses.

[Kevo00]

To be fair, London Buses are bloody fantastic now. I was singing in the Royal Albert Hall, so I told my parents to cross the road and get the 9, 10 or 378 destined for Hammersmith and Willsden. The announcement "9! To Hammersmith! Royal Albert Hall!" (exclamation marks added since Digital Doris always sounds so surprised upon making each announcement) meant that they (who are notorious for getting lost, and oddly particularly vulnerable when using SatNav) found the place with no problem at all

Barcelona, London and Prague have automated announcements on buses - I'm surprised it isn't more widespread.

You were singing in the Royal Albert Hall? I knew you had musical talents, but you were on at the Proms or something?

I agree that Digital Doris is a great idea, but it does tend to wind up trads who claim it disturbs them from their Evening Standard (previously London S***e). So I suspect one issue is that there is some commuter dislike of Digtal Doris from people who forget that not everyone takes the same bus every day. But you have to remember that London has an umbrella body in TfL that is funding everything, and the announcements are a TfL initiative, not a First, Stagecoach, Arriva or TransDev one. I'm not a huge fan of regulation, but I think buses are one UK industry where re-regulation could make a huge difference for reasons such as this - sadly in the current climate its not going to happen.