Edinburgh Tram developments

[oldman]

They are 140 feet long, in 7 articulated sections and have 78 seats.

And a total capacity of 250; I wouldn't fancy that on an Atlantean .

 

[Taunton]

And a total capacity of 250; I wouldn't fancy that on an Atlantean .

This is the 21st Century. And expecting people to travel from the city all the way out to the airport (well, certainly as far as Edinburgh Park) holding on to a pole is not the sort of experience that such huge investment should deliver. The parallel airport bus allows you all to sit down.

 

[takno]

Having made quite a stir with comments a while back in this thread, last week I was back in Edinburgh, and used the tram again. Twice. For the rather unusual reason that I was staying in the centre, and the person picking me up both days found it convenient to pick me up, and then drive on, at the airport.

It would have been much cheaper, and probably more convenient for both of you to do the pickup at the Park and Ride.

Although at 8 a.m. outward from the city it seemed better used. In fact better outward than inward, which is strange.

Where were you judging the inbound traffic? 8am would be quite early to be arriving in the centre, and a lot of the early traffic to the centre would get off at Haymarket since that's where the offices are. Anybody arriving to work in shops etc would be at least half an hour later. You would expect any traffic out of town that early to be going to Edinburgh Park.

Whoever designed the ticket machines needs to start again. A multi-step touch-screen machine, if south-facing in the morning sun (yes, even in Edinburgh) you can't really see it. And at one step the touch just didn't work. As it's where you press a +/- tile which is not really intuitive, I was puzzled by this, but eventually concluded a failure and went to the other (north facing) one, which worked. The second day I tried the original machine first, and it failed at the same point.

So you were able to buy a ticket without any significant issues, and the ticket machine you had an issue with was broken rather than badly designed?

Despite Edinburgh being a banking centre, they seem not to have heard that contactless etc has done away with minimum credit card values.

Pretty much only in the last year for most outlets. I imagine they will upgrade the machines to take contactless, but it could take a while

There's a new stop out by The Maybury called Edinburgh Gateway, interchange to the Fife rail line alongside at that point ... Only thing missing was, of course, passengers.

There wasn't much traffic going to the airport at 8am, in early Spring, when a train hadn't recently arrived at the connecting station? I'm not sure why this is surprising to you. The station is a bit overspecified because it was designed to be on the Dalmeny Chord, which I suspect they will end up building, but it's hardly the tram's fault that the Scottish Government cancelled half the traffic after they'd already started building the station.

But the greatest stupidity was the last, at the airport. Fares are £1.60 anywhere, except to the final stop at the airport, which is £5.50. Probably about 20 people got off there both days. There were SIX (yes, I counted them) ticket inspection staff, gruffly demanding "Tickets" (no "Please") from the passengers. SIX.

So don't get off at the final stop - it's not a good place to get picked up by car. Hell, if you're at all concerned about cost why didn't you get the bus to the airport? The ticket collectors turn around as soon as the tram has emptied and help people which seems to be generally welcomed and gets the trams departing smoothly. Six sounds a little high though, so they may have been having a blitz - if you're doing random ticket checks to scare people into paying every time then you need to turn up en-masse to stop anybody getting past, and you can't do the check until people have already committed the offence, otherwise they will know that if there is an inspection they just get off at the park and ride and buy a valid ticket from there.

I got dropped off by car at the airport at the end of my trip. I did wonder if there are more escalators at Edinburgh Gateway tram stop than in the whole of Edinburgh Airport.

I count 5 or 6 in the airport. The ones up to departures often have a queue, so really they need more in the airport rather than less at Gateway.

Essentially it sounds like you made a series of bad decisions and didn't enjoy what is always going to be a boring commute, so you spent it thinking up petty reasons to assume other people are incompetent.

 

[TheEscapist_]

Someone mentioned the seats on the tram, I do agree there isn't enough. Too many luggage racks that are never used.


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[asylumxl]

Essentially it sounds like you made a series of bad decisions and didn't enjoy what is always going to be a boring commute, so you spent it thinking up petty reasons to assume other people are incompetent.

It's popular to bash the trams in Edinburgh. People just like having something to complain about, the vast majority bitching about the disruption caused by its construction despite barely being affected by it.

The real irony is people complained about the disruption that'd have been caused if the line went to Leith/Newhaven, then they complained that the tram didn't go anywhere useful, would have been better going to Ocean Terminal and now they're bitching about the planned extension out there.

My family is from Edinburgh but it seems to me people in Edinburgh just like to have a good self-indulgent moan.

 

[Blindtraveler]

I take offence at that. The disruption was, and comr to think of it still is a real issue. Ocian termianal and the airport are not useful places to send it, if they had bothered to ask anybody who uses public transport in the area where they should chuck millions of pounds it would have been at speeding up journeys from major commuting areas not providing yet another tourist attraction.

Anyhow we have it now, and are suffering as a result. Roll on the day when they decide to give it to Serco to manage. Thats 1 contract I'd love them to win/mess up

 

[tbtc]

Ocian termianal and the airport are not useful places to send it

So they shouldn't have designed the tram to run to two corridors that see frequent bus services? Maybe you should complain about all of the buses that serve these destinations too, since you know better?

I know you want to complain about the tram, but some of the stuff on this thread is just silly.

One minute the tram is bad because it competes with an existing bus service, the next minute the tram is bad because it doesn't directly compete with an existing bus service (and takes a different intermediate route).

The tram is bad if bus passenger numbers go down (because it would have sucked passengers away, and what was the point of building an expensive tram to do the job that buses were doing anyway) but the tram is bad if bus passenger numbers go up (because that proves that Edinburgh's buses were doing a good job in the first place).

Now we see criticism that journeys leaving the city centre at eight o'clock in the morning (i.e. towards the large office parks on the western fringes) are busier than journeys into the city centre at that time (when few shops are open).

I'm not defending the delays in constructing it - I'm not defending the way that it was opened (it'd have been better to get an Edinburgh Park - Airport shuttle up and running before later extension to Haymarket and then further east), but it seems to be working pretty well once in operation - it serves a handful of ScotRail stations, a busy Airport, a Park & Ride, a shopping centre, several places of employment - I'm sure a lot of cities would be envious of that kind of light rail.

Now, on to Leith!

 

[endecotp]

Can anyone quantify how the seated/standing ratio compares to other UK tram networks?

To me it does look to have few seats compared to e.g. the Tube, and the journey is a long one to stand.

 

[Techniquest]

Anyone who's been up Leith Walk, by foot or bus (it's not overly fun walking the length of the Walk to Waverley in that direction!) will know how busy it is all day long. The buses manage just fine up that way (let's ignore Lothian's fares system for now) so why add a tram line to Leith when it's not entirely needed?

The western side of the proposed loop around Granton would be far more useful. Finishing the line westwards to its originally intended destination (forgive my failure to remember the name of the town right now) would also make sense to me.

It should be obvious by now I'm not a big fan of the slow trams in Edinburgh. It would be a system envious by other cities if it actually carried many passengers! I've yet to be on a tram anywhere in Edinburgh that's more than half-full, and I've been on the system at times when people are commuting west to the offices. Maybe I've been unlucky, or maybe watching trams from near Waverley means I'm missing the crowds of hundreds of people who just can't board the trams as they're just so busy...

I also took dislike to tbtc's inference that Blindtraveller is not experienced with buses in Edinburgh. Blindtraveller is a very regular user of Lothian Buses, and buses in general up there, so I would suggest he knows what he's talking about.

 

[oldman]

The Leith-Newhaven extension would serve a dense population and would likely be busy and cheap to operate. The Granton loop serves the northern schemes but takes a roundabout way through very leafy suburbs to get there.

One of the problems of the existing route is the low level of residential traffic within Edinburgh as it skirts gingerly round the Stenhouse/Broomhouse schemes where a lot of people live.

 

[tbtc]

Anyone who's been up Leith Walk, by foot or bus (it's not overly fun walking the length of the Walk to Waverley in that direction!) will know how busy it is all day long. The buses manage just fine up that way (let's ignore Lothian's fares system for now) so why add a tram line to Leith when it's not entirely needed?

It would be a system envious by other cities if it actually carried many passengers! I've yet to be on a tram anywhere in Edinburgh that's more than half-full

You're complaining that the trams aren't full, but you don't want the tram to go down one of the busiest corridors in Scotland because trams aren't needed down a road that sees a double decker bus every minute or two?

This is what I was on about earlier - people don't want the tram to run down corridors with existing bus services but then complain when it serves areas without significant population (i.e. between Broomhouse and Haymarket).

The western side of the proposed loop around Granton would be far more useful

What population is there around there these days though (compared to the density you could serve down Leith Walk towards Ocean Terminal)?

I also took dislike to tbtc's inference that Blindtraveller is not experienced with buses in Edinburgh. Blindtraveller is a very regular user of Lothian Buses, and buses in general up there, so I would suggest he knows what he's talking about

He said that "Ocian termianal and the airport are not useful places to send it".

For me, having termini on the outskirts of the city, at busy popular destinations, where several buses terminate per hour seem the perfect places to run a light rail scheme to.

If you want to build heavy rail or light rail, look at the places that significant numbers of people go to - look at the busy car parks - look at the frequent commercial bus services - use that to identify corridors that could justify a tram or a train.

Ocean Terminal, Leith Walk, The Gyle, Edinburgh Park, Ingliston Park And Ride and the Airport seem to tick those boxes for me.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Whilst they might tick boxes, the whole scheme would in fact do better on flows where the passenger demand is high but the existing bus services are for whatever reason slow or limmited. Journeytimes to the gyle and the airport are slower by tram and there will be little is likely to be little change to the bus travel time on the route to Leith/OT.

The Granton/Northwest areas are in fact well populated and with Edinburgh Coledge and Scottish gass would be well used IMO, and people would use it as the journey times would be faster.

 

[Techniquest]

What I think is the bigger issue is that not a single person wants months and months of delays like last time.

Besides, if the people of Edinburgh have said they don't want any more tram lines then that's what should matter. I don't see the need to send trams up roads that are well served already by buses, that's a waste of time. If the idea was to create new and better/fast journeys then it would be fine, let's do it, but Edinburgh city centre to Ocean Terminal is already well served by bus and doesn't need the tram. Quite, the airport didn't need the tram either really.

As for Granton, I seem to remember using buses up that way last time I was in Edinburgh and the buses were in good demand. The problem? They didn't go anywhere near the airport or a fast way to the city centre. Granton to Haymarket then onwards to the airport, and indeed towards the city centre, would be more useful. Hell just open the line from Princes Street around to Granton and maybe, just maybe, Ocean Terminal and it could turn out a success.

Still, I suspect common sense will eventually rule the roost and the council won't waste good money on a tram extension that's unwanted. Only one way to find out I'm afraid...

 

[Blindtraveler]

I seam to recall we used a taxi from my house to Haymarket, demand that could have been met by a tram

 

[Starmill]

I live hundreds of miles from Edinburgh and I have only had 10-20 trips on an Edinburgh tram but I have been on several that were full and standing. As I am confident many are, every day.

 

[takno]

Besides, if the people of Edinburgh have said they don't want any more tram lines then that's what should matter.

When have they ever said that? I've definitely never been asked

 

[Blindtraveler]

Welll in a roundabout way we were all asked yesturday at the Balot Box, the results of which in Edinburgh have put the (we will not spend any more money on the tras) SNP and the really rather unsure torys on top at council HQ. Assuming we get a coalition this could be interesting.

 

[Leki]

Bizarre attitudes on this thread as always.

Trams have been running for nearly 3 years and the evidence of how well they're doing is out there. Anyone trying to discredit them with anecdotes or hearsay is just being daft.

The council - including SNP members - agreed a package of enabling works for the extension back in 2015 which is going on right now.

 

[clc]

Welll in a roundabout way we were all asked yesturday at the Balot Box, the results of which in Edinburgh have put the (we will not spend any more money on the tras) SNP and the really rather unsure torys on top at council HQ. Assuming we get a coalition this could be interesting.

The Scottish Govt said that, but the SNP group on the council take a different view. I expect the extension will go ahead.

 

[Blindtraveler]

The SNP bloke who came a knocking at my door the other day said they were pritty hard line locally that the figures for both business case and who was paying the bills had to stack up and be wind, water and airtight before they would agree. Looking like a potential green/SNP administration here now but stilll early days but the Greens are more interested in local issues and public services round here so the SNP may not get the support they want. Whilst the extention may well come it may well be subject to scrutiny and better financials before any further works are done.

 

[takno]

The SNP bloke who came a knocking at my door the other day said they were pritty hard line locally that the figures for both business case and who was paying the bills had to stack up and be wind, water and airtight before they would agree. Looking like a potential green/SNP administration here now but stilll early days but the Greens are more interested in local issues and public services round here so the SNP may not get the support they want. Whilst the extention may well come it may well be subject to scrutiny and better financials before any further works are done.

SNP/Green would struggle to get stuff through. I'd have thought SNP/Labour/Green was more likely. Either way there's still a lot of will for getting the tram through on the council and the finances are largely sorted. There was never any cast iron guarantee even under Labour, but I don't think it's any less likely now.

 

[asylumxl]

I can't help feel that my point has been proven. People have posted their arguments against the tram extension and have contradicted themselves on several occasions. It seems they're damned if they do and damned if they don't.

Don't get me wrong, my family is from Edinburgh and I adore the city, but the inhabitants do love a good moan. If there was nothing to complain or be sarky about I imagine some people would lose their minds.

Personally, I think the tram system will expand in the future and serve more residents and opinions will slowly shift in favour of it.

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[chiltern trev]

Tram Experience – European Rugby Week-end.

Overall we had a good tram experience and managed to avoid or mitigate the really bad bits. Details below with a few questions for those of you who are more knowledgeable on the tram system.

Have got back from a week-end in Edinburgh. We had tickets for both:
- European Challenge Cup Final, Gloucester vs. Stade Francais, 20.00 Friday 12th May, attendance 25,000
- European Champions Cup Final, Saracens vs. Clermont, 17.00 Saturday 13th May, attendance 55,000.

We stayed at South Queensferry (drove up from Carlisle) and used the Ingliston Park and Ride. On each day we bought a £4 Day Ticket (valid for both bus and tram city limit area) as this seemed better value than a £3.20 return as all it needed was one extra tram or bus journey and we were ‘in profit’ (which is what happened) and provided more flexibility.

Our inbound trip at 15.00 Friday was comfortable – we all got seats and we alighted at the Princess Street stop.
Our inbound trip at about 11.00 Saturday was less comfortable – we did not get seats – must have picked a time co-inciding with busy flight times. There were no seats free when the tram arrived at Ingliston P&R so we stood all the way to St Andrews Sq and alighted at York Place. Standing was OK and the ride was very smooth due to smooth track and careful considerate acceleration and braking.

On Friday we returned to Murrayfield from Princes Street at about 18.30 (90 minutes before kick off) and managed to get on the first tram which arrived with all seat taken and about 1/3 standing space occupied. All passengers boarding managed to board and it left full. I don’t know how a few more got on at West End - Princess St but they did and we left lots behind. We alighted at Murrayfield and crossed both tracks at the west end of the platforms – stewards in place controlling the crowds and the tram crossing. There was a full ticket check on alighting with 2 tram personnel selling tickets before the ticket check line (similar to that which we have experienced at Twickenham station).

After the match (Friday) we left 3 minutes before the end (final whistle), joined the single tram queue on the flat, snaked around for 100m moving at walking space and then segregated into the westbound queue at the bottom of the steps. As 90% of the passengers were heading eastbound (in bound) we were able to go straight up the steps, across both tracks (at east end of platforms) and waited a few minutes and got on the first tram which left all seats taken and 2/3 standing taken – not sardines. The same for after the Saturday match.

On Saturday we decided we would get on the tram at York Place so as to get a seat all the way to Murrayfield. On this trip we boarded at York Place at 15.00 (120 minutes before kick off) and the tram left passengers behind at Prince Street. On this journey, having left St Andrews Square stop and turned the corned onto Princess Street, it seemed to take an age to travel to the Princess Street stop – it seemed like we were stuck at one intersection (by the tour buses) for at least 2 changes of traffic lights whilst numerous buses undertook in the same direction.


Murrayfield tram stop – design flaw?. To access the westbound platform you have to cross both tracks. I would have though that a better design would be to have an underpass so as to not have to cross the tracks Also an underpass would have assisted queue management (east and west bound separation) after the match. I presume this was deemed not to be cost effective for about 6-10 matches per year.

Princes Street – Princess Street stop to/from St Andews Square – it seems to take an age to traverse this part of Princess Street. Is there some kind of inherent traffic light/tram control/sequencing problem here?

On both days it was stated as having an enhanced service but no details were available from the website site or staff as to what enhanced meant, i.e. every x minutes. My impression was that it was not much of an enhancement. Looking at the published timetable of every 7 minutes 07.00 to 19.00 then the actual running times shown on the tram stops screens suggested 5 or 6 or 7 minutes.

What is the electrical supply limit in terms of tram frequency – how frequent does the service have to be to trip out the power supply? Can it delivery a tram every 3 minutes? Or a tram every 2.5 minutes?
And if trams succeed in bunching up, i.e. too many nose to tail on same track, at what point will the power trip out? 3 trams together?
I presume each line has it’s own electrical section.

Where are the crossovers between the depot and York Place. I only managed to observe one at West End - Princes Street (west end of stop).

Thinking about it whilst writing this, I get the impression the enhanced service was designed around providing enough capacity between Murrayfield and Ingliston P&R / Airport and the Murrayfield <> York Place section had to survive with the same capacity. Note – for Haymarket <> Murrayfield the clear answer is walk.

Given that all the trams for the full system have been delivered, not all (allowing for maintenance etc) appeared to be in service. Is it possible to provide 2 services – (a) Airport to York Place at every 5 or 6 minutes and (b) Murrayfield <> St Andrews Square and extra 1 or 2 trams inserted between the full route trams. But to do so needs crossovers.

The queuing system after the match worked OK for us as we left before the final whistle. But perhaps having 2 complete separate queue for Airport and City would have been better – not one initial queue which then splits.

 

[Starmill]

I haven't heard any suggestion that there insufficient power in the supply, although I have heard that reversal at York Place may limit the current frequency, even though there is a surplus of rolling stock. Yet another reason to extend the eastern terminus to a more suitable location - one with two platforms may ease this.

 

[Zoidberg]

Tram Experience – European Rugby Week-end.

...

Thanks very much for posting about your experience, interesting read.

I do hope you enjoyed your weekend in civilisation

I'll forgive the references to Princess Street, it's Princes Street

 

[Taunton]

The Murrayfield stop was trumpeted as one of the key benefits of the system, to handle large crowds to and from there, so I suppose it should come as no surprise, based on past performance, that on key match days half the fleet is still, like the rest of the time, left in the depot. Are there enough drivers to handle any service increase? And apart from turnrounds at York Place, which any competent operator could devise a rostering arrangement to handle, could the longwinded traffic signal settings along Princes Street handle any increase in tram frequency?

I have to say that the references to being able to Get A Seat in the tram on match days raise a wry smile. Quite apart from my points above about how few seats there are in the trams in the first place, it does seem like a bit of a First World problem, writing from London, where the inability to even get in through the doors of the next train, and often the one after that, is a daily issue for many, spreading now from the high peak into the shoulders, and indeed increasingly even at weekends nowadays.

 

[sng7]

The main limitation on tram frequency is more a case of how much it effects the rest of the traffic on princes street rather than the power supply, for the 6 nations they normally run every 5 minutes which i think is the limit as they aslo have extra buses on and they all have to get along princes street.

 

[AngusH]

As well as West Princes Street I think there are crossovers immediately after Haymarket (with the siding) then at Edinburgh Park station. Plus obviously the depot and the two terminus stations.

I don't think there are others? Although I may be wrong.


Does the point where the planned branch to Newhaven starts have a set of points, or is it just passively built?


I attended a presentation given by an engineer from the project (after completion) where I think it was said that they really wished every station would have a cross-over, for better flexibility.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Its the 1 time I am glad we have the infernal thing, match days.

I cannot add to any above posts but agree on crossover situation, journey time and Murryfield station comments, the latter should have had a better setup I agree but at least we have it.

There were also a number of other things on in the city this weekend which will have added to the loads

 

[Blindtraveler]

Part suspended today due to flooding between Edinburgh Park Central and the airport. Given it stopped raining around midnight Im rather surprised it didnt happen yesturday instead.