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CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Infrastructure
"Leith and Granton spur tram routes back on agenda"
(62 posts)-
Posted 9 years ago #
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Boooooo! if it takes out the NEPN.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Boooooo! if it takes out the NEPN.
Is that a realistic option? I seriously hope it isn't, the NEPN, especially the section from the Red Bridge to Hawthornvale, is heavily used by peds/cyclists.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The original plans showed a 1.5m wide path with a fence on one side next to the trams. Although the path would still be there, it would effectively render it unusable. Worse than the canal towpath.
Posted 9 years ago # -
The priority ought to be running down Leith Walk, to Newhaven. They have the rails, the materials, equipment, rolling stock. Cost c. £80 million to complete Phase 1.
Next priority ought to be south to the ERI, but can't see that happening soon.
Posted 9 years ago # -
@crowriver Yup. I really can't see the point of the Granton spur (but then, I don't live down that way...). Leith Walk/Newhaven has much greater potential to be "transformational".
Posted 9 years ago # -
Is there enough room for a tram track and a cyclepath on the same alignment? How much clearance is needed between the two? Maybe more than this https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=599729786718506
Posted 9 years ago # -
That train going over the vegetables in the market, has more clearance then the tram would have on NEPN?
Agree run it down leith walk but not out to Granton.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"Is there enough room for a tram track and a cyclepath on the same alignment?"
According to previous plans, yes - with amount severely restricted at some bridges.
Also a lot of scepticism about whether really possible.
Plus the whole corridor would be shut for a long time while construction happened.
Whether it's a sensible/value for money transport option is whole other question.
Perhaps there should some 'think again' options - like serving the Western General...
Posted 9 years ago # -
Not forgetting -
"
Details of company structure and the tram operating agreement will be presented to the full council meeting next week. Transport for Edinburgh will initially oversee both tram and bus services but, with an integrated transport strategy, there is potential to look wider and bring in pedestrian and cycle routes into the approach and to consider other transport issues.
"
Posted 9 years ago # -
@chdot
Plus the whole corridor would be shut for a long time while construction happened.
Which section specifically? (On the NEPN.)
Posted 9 years ago # -
Roseburn corridor basically.
Plans/opportunities for detours weren't great, so even doing shorter lengths of closure than previously planned wouldn't be great.
Most trees would be removed, the cycle path would be right next to a 'railway' (off-road tram speeds) etc.
Main reason is to 'allow' waterfront developments to proceed.
Whether this would happen (or not happen without the trams) and worth the tramline price, are open questions.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I'm still a bit confused. I was expecting it to be, say, the Victoria junction to Lindsay Rd - or something similar.
Are we talking about the extension from York Place to Newhaven?
Posted 9 years ago # -
The Roseburn - Red Bridge - Granton section.
The Leith Walk - Victoria Quay - (maybe) Newhaven "spur" is more likely to happen.
The original plan for a loop was abandoned a while ago as it was 'decided' that the Granton - Newhaven section was 'uneconomic'.
Posted 9 years ago # -
For a while, I was going to have a tram that took me from home (Leith) to work (Granton) and on to boyfriend's house (Roseburn) and airport (should I need to escape the country). Then that all got cancelled. Since then I've started cycling to work, moved in with boyfriend, and have a very nice cycle commute to work down the Roseburn path, so the "reinvigorated Granton loop" idea is no use to me now. Would be fun to see the tram going right past my work though (which is how the Waterfront estate was designed, I understand).
Posted 9 years ago # -
Unfortunately the same things that make NEPN great for cycling make it prime tram territory. It's not exactly going to be hard (or expensive) to put light rail tracks down on a former heavy rail bed, compared with the agony of running the line through the city centre.
It's hard to know how this one will play out. I read an article somewhere the other day which was going on about the need to build the tram over the cycleway as an enabling measure for mass housing at Newhaven, in turn saving the green belt in the south/west of the city.
But, without NEPN I'm not sure my commute would be viable.
Posted 9 years ago # -
This might all be back 'on the agenda' but that makes it a long way from project being scoped, contracts written up and construction starting.
And there are also an awful lot of people who have not lost their memory overnight and can remember the shambolic disaster zone that Princes Street (to pick the most iconic) was during construction.
I suspect the Leith walk part might be made to work if private money comes into play - infra having been moved etc.
As for the other routes, I really cant see the council shelling out more tens / hundreds of millions in the current economic climate - even if some of the proposals (route to little france) sound quite sensible.
As to the NEPN part, if they decide to make it happen, my guess is that 'the greater good' will be cited as a reason to ignore cyclists/pedestrians.
Posted 9 years ago # -
I counted the number of riders on NEPN this morning and there were 68 (including me). Almost all of these were coming the other way, but even being generous and doubling the count to ~135 for the total flow, that's very few people in the grand scheme of things.
That was for a 15 minute period so maybe, if we were extremely generous, there might be 600 bike journeys on NEPN at either end of the day.
It's not likely that many people cycling on NEPN would be replace it with a tram ride IMO (so that would be a significant number of extra car journeys - 500?) but how many passengers can a single tram carry? Surely it's got to be a few hundred, and there would be a service every 15 minutes... a lot more people?
Would it not be for the greater good to shaft cycling?
Posted 9 years ago # -
Should you not be comparing the potential for tram traffic against the potential for cycle traffic?
Only 600 cyclists today. But what if changes to policy/infrastructure increased that to 6000 in the future (for a cost much less than the tram works?)
Posted 9 years ago # -
Waverley to the Royal Infirmary was the obvious first tram line to build. It has all the traffic generators - the main railway station and the city centre at one end, the main hospital at the other, and in between a large university, streets thronged with pedestrians, an Olympic size swimming pool, popular parks and a shopping centre with a hypermarket.
I can see why they might decide to
totally trash the city's main cycling assetbuild the Granton spur (less roadworks, more development) but it would be seriously short-sighted. The main point of the tram has surely got to be to transport people around the city, and the south side has a lot of people, and streets jammed with cars and buses. Also, after the first line they really ought to have worked out by now how to do the enabling works and lay the line cleanly and efficiently and quickly, without all that incompetence and hysteria.Posted 9 years ago # -
The priority ought to be running down Leith Walk, to Newhaven. They have the rails, the materials, equipment, rolling stock.
Indeed, I saw a huge stockpile of tram rails and overhead line poles in storage at the old Balgreen Allotments (by the boolin' green) from the train the other day.
Referring to this post and quoting the council in the planning application for the houses at Balbirnie place; this section of the tram
network will not now be taken forward and therefore the proposals will not have an adverse impact on the proposed tram network..I can see for the tram planners that the NEPN looks like a cheap, attractive and easy corridor down which to run a tram. However it would effectively be running as a rail service, off the streets with platforms accessed by long ramps / lifts / steps and only at a fairly wide spacing where existing roads already cross the path. It was never a particularly successful or highly patronised passenger network back in the days of yore (service schedule, station locations were part of this, but too much competition from trams and later buses, ironically, was the main reason). The main purpose of these rail lines was freight access to Leith and Granton docks. The trams should be up on the roads, with fairly closes spaced stops, to allow buses to be removed and to try and encourage drivists off. It shouldn't be running along leafy Victorian freight railways that already provide a very cheap, low-maintenance transport network around the city.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"Waverley to the Royal Infirmary was the obvious first tram line to build"
Which demonstrates the fact that this was/is about 'politics' more than 'transport'.
The first line was (to a large extent) about connecting civil servants at Victoria Quay with the airport.
Adding another transport option along a corridor with lots of railway certainly wasn't about 'transport planning'. Certainly not in a city that also had a popular, well used and (generally) well run bus system.
"after the first line they really ought to have worked out by now how to do the enabling works and lay the line cleanly and efficiently and quickly, without all that incompetence and hysteria"
Well, yes, but...
No-one who might have learnt anything is still around - except I suppose Hinds/Burns/Bruce.
You would hope they would have learned that there are cheaper and more effective ways of doing what they purport to want to do - encourage 'active travel' and reduce car use (which would improve bus journey times/usage without much extra expense).
As previously discussed, the tram didn't lead to much improvement in the city centre public transport options.
Don't know how much tram/bus interchange there is at Haymarket - at least there are additional train options.
Don't suppose there's a great deal at The Mound/Princes Street/Hanover Street or St. Andrew Sq./Waverley.
IF lots of houses are built at the waterfront is a tram best/value for money way to move people?
Posted 9 years ago # -
Here's interchange info for (another) Haymarket Station.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Unless there is private money in there, this hasnt got a hope in hell of happening. The Council is skint, and central government has better things to do than spend capital on unpopular tram schemes. The days when the opposition could force the Scottish Government to spend nearly all its capital for 4 years on a white elephant are gone (and not coming back to look at the opinion polls).
Posted 9 years ago # -
Manchester started with one tram line which was hated until it started running then popular, so much so that they built another.
Same I think in Dublin (and they already had the DART)
the running it down to picardy place or beyond is linked to the consortium allegedly bulldozing New St Andrews House and environs (except John Lewis of course)
Posted 9 years ago # -
mgj - The Scottish Parliament voted that the tram scheme should go ahead, against the wishes of the then minority SNP administration - that's democracy for you.
I'm not sure who told you that £500m represents four years worth of Scottish Government's capital budget - its annual capital budget is close to £3bn. If you are concerned about Scottish Government funded white elephants then I suggest you look at the (ahem) Forth Replacement Crossing.
Posted 9 years ago # -
Talking of Manchester trams - the new tram line to the airport has just opened! By my count, reaching the airport was the twenty-first stage of their tram network's development. Rather than the first.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"Waverley to the Royal Infirmary was the obvious first tram line to build"
Given that Leith Walk is the most densely populated area in Scotland, with a very low car ownership, I'd say Leith Walk is pretty high priority for mass transport infrastructure.
Southside 'twixt Old Town and start of Grange also fairly densely populated, but after that low density. So less custom for a tram line I reckon.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"
So how has Manchester succeeded when so many other cities have failed? Easy, said Jon Lamonte, chief executive of Transport for Greater Manchester, which runs the transport network on behalf of the 10 local authorities. The government trusted his team to get on with it rather than trying to micromanage everything from Whitehall. “What it reflects is how successful we can be when Greater Manchester is given the funding and power to build something ourselves,” he said. “It shows the power of what you can do on a local basis.”
"
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/nov/02/manchester-metrolink-line-opens-ahead-schedule
Sadly no lessons there for Edinburgh/Scotland.
The micromanaging was very local!
Unfortunately they managed the micro in such a fashion that it messed up the macro and destroyed any appetite for 'more' - at least amongst Edinburgh punters/payers.
Also -
"
Transport for Greater Manchester, which runs the transport network on behalf of the 10 local authorities.
"
Imagine a body that covered (for instance) the Lothians and Fife and had a competent overall understanding of transport, and some powers AND money!!
Might manage some 'region-wide' commuting cycle routes and integrate the Borders Line with the South Sub - and routes to the west - and perhaps different solutions for crossing the Forth. Might even have something left for making sense with George Street.
Posted 9 years ago # -
"If you are concerned about Scottish Government funded white elephants then I suggest you look at the (ahem) Forth Replacement Crossing."
Forth 'Resilience' Crossing please, as the 1960s Forth Road Bridge is not, after all, falling down and has not required to be built up again with sticks and stones, silver and gold, nor indeed anything else.
Posted 9 years ago #
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