Tag Archives: westconnex
Baird-Connex
By Mr Hounsell
Here are some notes I wrote in 2015 on the Westconnex & the Western Harbour Tunnel and their political origins …
The 23rd of April 2014 was a good day for the voters of Manly, Curl Curl, Balgowlah, and Seaforth. On that Wednesday, their local member Mike Baird (1 April 1968) became the Premier of New South Wales. At the same time, the Prime Minister of Australia was their federal member Tony Abbott (4 November 1957). Mike Baird and Tony Abbot share more than their electors, they are also very similar men.
Vehicle Travel Time Savings
Here are some notes I wrote in 2015 on (Vehicle Travel Time Savings) VTTS and Westconnex …
Level of Service on Westconnex after Stage 3
SMPO. 2013, "[Westconnex] Business Case Executive Summary", State of NSW.
Newtown Square – build identity and connect businesses
Built around Sydney's tramways in 1890s, Newtown needs KPIs to prioritise humans not cars.
Proposed changes overlaid on aerial photography
The proposed transformation will activate Newtown as a premier destination for locals, as well as domestic and international visitors.
Bring the tram sheds back to life – creating a new gathering point. Landscape and open the areas around the tram sheds, with increased passive surveillance and human scale lighting. Make more spaces to sit, reducing crowding, and create new cooling green islands.
Create quicker connections between business areas with new paths. Most people head straight to northern King St. Use shared identity, anchors, and wayfinding to encourage visitors to spread.
Newtown only receives 10% of the international visitors as the Opera House
Reactivate Brennan Lane and the old path along the Bank Hotel.
Transport Media Coverage, Transport Planning
Trams: Rebuilding what was lost
Sydney had one of the world's largest and most used urban public transport systems. Mathew Hounsell explores Sydney's old tram system and looks at what inner city councils are interested in resurrecting.
In 1945, the NSW Government op­erated the city's urban transport network as 291 kilometres of sur­face light rail that served 405 million passengers a year, all while making a profit.
The history of Sydney's light rail is a fascinating one. Sydney's first trams were horse drawn, and later cable cars were introduced along the North Sydney line. It was the flexibility and reliability of electric trams that allowed the tram system to take off and saw the first electric power plants built in Sydney, with spare capac­ity for businesses and homes. The network expanded a few kilometres at a time, like a growing tree, except in some circumstances where powerful politicians decided a tram would improve their local streets.
Mathew Hounsell
Read the whole thing in the Inner West Voice.
How does public transport stack up against motorways?
Regardless of how it is financed, all infrastructure is paid for by NSW residents , through either fees or taxes. So we deserve to know whether the government is prioritising projects that give us the greatest bang for our buck, writes Mathew Hounsell.
To move 24,000 people in an hour takes twenty double-deck trains, 100 light rail vehicles, 240 bendy-buses or a ten lane toll road.
The NSW and Commonwealth governments plan to spend $1.26 billion to build a 14 kilometre motorway from the M7 to the proposed airport at Badgerys Creek [1]. A six lane motorway could carry up to 7,200 persons an hour to the new employment centre of Western Sydney at a cost of $90 million per kilometre. Transurban, the remaining Sydney toll road operator, plans to build NorthConnex, a twin three lane, nine kilometre, motorway tunnel for $3 billion – $333 million a kilometre. The proposed WestConnex motorway is estimated to cost at least $15 billion [2].
That 7,200 hourly capacity looks feeble when compared to rail. For example, the Moreton Bay Rail Link (Commonweath and Queensland governments) is costing $1.15 billion [3]. It's a 12.6 kilometre railway with six stations and twenty-two bridges, most over roads. With modern signalling one such two-track rail line can carry between 36,000 persons an hour, or 48,000 if you're as ambitious and competent as the French.
Mathew Hounsel
Connecting the Northern Beaches – Metro or Motorway
A public presentation to the two P&C committees of schools impacted by the Western Harbour Tunnel & the Northern Beaches Link.
The presentation can be watched below and the slides are available as a PDF.
The presentation discusses the Sydney Metro assessments of two Dee Why to North Sydney metros that were part of the previous plans.
Figure 3 – Proposed staging plan.
The proposed metros would have reduced traffic in Sydney (despite the pro-road bias of the model).
Figure 4.24 Change in Vehicle Kilometres Travelled (VKT)
The Dem and St Mary's info night. Video 3. Alternatives to building motorways.
'Mathew Hounsell talks about the $41 billion cost of the current set of roads, and the induced demand effect – build more roads and more cars will come. He unraveled the lack of business case for the roads and highlighted their inefficiencies. The proposed train based solutions to the Northern Beaches would be cheaper, carry more people, and not congest the roads with more traffic.
Also touches on how the filtration issue is used to divide and conquer groups who object to motorways.'
Stop The Tunnels
If you want to help congestion, a rail link is much better than the motorway. Michelle Zeibots
Dr Zeibots discusses the fundamentals including the Mogridge Principle.
A transport expert explains the traffic numbers. WestConnex doesn't add up unless more motorways are added to pump up the traffic numbers.
If the aim is to move people and reduce congestion, then a rail solution makes a lot more sense.
This was an information night in conjunction with Cammeray and Anzac Park Public Schools P&C's reviewing the risk assessment that has been undertaken by our tunnels committee along with hearing from experts in engineering, environment, health and planning. The aim of the evening is to inform the parents of the school with regard to the overall plan, risks and impacts so they can best engage with the planning process and understand the impacts. This is not an RMS information session.
www.stopthetunnel.org
Impact of the WestConnex project
The submission #426 is available as a PDF or from the NSW Legislative Council Public Accountability Committee Inquiry – "Impact of the WestConnex project" established on 21 June 2018.
I am a Transport Analyst and Planner, and as an independent citizen I have been studying transport in Sydney since 2008, specifically the M4, the M5 and Kingsford Smith Airport.
I have been studying the Westconnex since it first appeared in drops to the Daily Telegraph in mid-2012. I have provided independent technical and historical analysis of the project to the community and I am one of the persons most familiar with the project outside of its contractors.
This submission aims to address a key few of the inquiry's terms of reference. Westconnex is not a single project, it is a brand that has been used for public relations to cover a range of existing road upgrade projects and long-planned motorway. Westconnex must also be considered in the context of the departments full plan which always included additional projects like the Campbell St widening, Quantas Dr widening, F6, and an M2-M4 motorway. Recently, the Westconnex brand has been used by the government to create new projects such as the Western Harbour Tunnel.
This submission has been written to provide the committee with the big picture and then some detailed technical information. I have attempted to provide information to assist you in understanding the hidden historical context.
I apologise that this submission is not exhaustive. During the writing process, I came to realise that an 18-page submission with attachments barely scratches the surface on this topic. …
Read the submission (as a PDF ) to find out when & why the NSW roads department changed the plan to create the Western Harbour Tunnel from the one shown below. (Hint: Manly)
Part 3: Initial Project submissions – M4 Extension
Source: Department of Transport, 2010. "Infrastructure Australia – Updated Submission by the NSW Government 2010"
Listen Westconnex, motorists are just not that attracted to you
I told you so …
After the introduction of tolls the M4 is unattractive.
"However, according to the numbers contained in the EIS and Appendices the widening of the M4 will actually reduce the total amount of traffic in the corridor. The government acknowledges that there will be an increase in traffic on Parramatta Rd as motorists compare the toll to their Value of Travel Time Savings (VTTS) and find it to be too high. However the government does not mention the fact that there will be a total reduction in traffic within the corridor as discretionary or impulse trips are deferred or redirected to other transport modes like public transport."
Read the full NoW PT submission on the M4 widening (PDF).
Excerpts from the submission:
Tolls and Patronage
On 16 February 2010, the concession on the M4 Motorway expired and ownership was transferred from Statewide Roads to the NSW Government. The toll on the M4 Motorway was removed at this time. Immediately prior to its removal, the motorway toll was $2.75 for cars and $6.60 for trucks [excluding the Cash-Back program]. ([EIS] – Appendix D – Page 91)
From the RTA's assessment there was a 500 vehicle drop in traffic on Parramatta Road in the four hours of the morning and a 1500 vehicle increase in vehicles on the M4 (Western Expressway). This represents an induced traffic effect of over one thousand vehicles. The effect is evident by the immediate visible increase in road congestion and reduction in travel speeds experience on Sydney's roads. After the toll was removed, the average monthly rail patronage started to slide because of the significantly reduced patronage caused by mode shift to private vehicles. With each month, the new reduced baseline pulled the twelve month rail patronage average lower.
You can see quite clearly on the below graph where the slower timetables and removal of the toll on the Western Expressway have significantly reduced the patronage on the Western Line. However you can also see that the trend is holding for over 150% growth (300,000 passengers a month) above the 2001 figures.
Persons shifted from Western Line Trains when the M4 toll was removed.
Westconnex Meeting at Balmain
Dr Zeibots and Mr Hounsell address a public meeting at Balmain after Westconnex Stage 3 & Stage 4 revealed.