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Idea: Metrolink down Manchester's Oxford/Wilmslow Road

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Bletchleyite

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From: https://www.railforums.co.uk/thread...hester-piccadilly.152254/page-44#post-3616735

The idea sounds great but is actually totally unviable precisely because of the huge demand. If a Metrolink line down Oxford Road was segregated from the rest of the network to avoid overloading it and was 20-25tph (maximum for long on street street sections) then it would still struggle to meet demand and fewer places could be served than bus.

I'm not sure I agree on capacity. If a double tram was used on all services (why don't Metrolink just order a 4-car variant?) and they operated every 5 minutes I'd say capacity would be quite adequate. The buses by and large aren't actually full.
 
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Bletchleyite

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Shouldn't this be in other public transport?

I'd suggest as it's a speculative idea for rail public transport in the UK that it is on-topic here. But I'll allow the moderators to decide and move it if applicable; if you think it's wrong, maybe better to hit "report" than to discuss it with someone who can't actually move it? :)
 

Bletchleyite

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Not really as journey time comes into play. The tram would not be much quicker down Oxford Road as there are issues with interaction with other traffic etc. Manchester - London coaches can't do 125 mph that the trains can. I can never understand why many rail people appear so anti-bus.

I'm very much not anti-bus. I'm in favour of buses in the correct role, which is to connect passengers to a high capacity rapid transit rail service (trams included) on busy corridors.
 

61653 HTAFC

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Getting the crayons out, a cut and cover tramline down Oxford Road would be ideal, with fewer stops than buses and just serving the key points (aquatics centre, universities, Christie hospital, Withington triangle) before surfacing and running (segregated where possible) to the main destination currently served by buses: probably Stockport where it could form a link between the bus station, town centre and railway station.

This wouldn't remove all the buses from the corridor, but it would significantly reduce congestion along there.
 

apk55

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My own thoughts would be more for a line starting from Piccadilly, going through the university area then following Princess parkway to Cholton then joining up with the airport line, terminating at Sale water park park and ride. Possible short extension from there to Altrincham line at Dane road (alongside M60). Could offer some relief for the congested section through Cornbrook. As well as students the university area is a major employment area, includes hospitals etc so traffic potential is good.
 

mmh

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What would the destination be? Didsbury or Wythenshawe would be the most likely, but they already have tram routes. I can't see this being feasible, mostly because there's no opportunity for off-street running and most of Wilmslow Road isn't wide enough to support tram and car traffic and has too frequent crossroads. For a lot of it you'd struggle to find suitable places to fit the stops in I think, or you'd have stops which block the traffic when occupied by a tram.
 

Starmill

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This is very unlikely to be a project supported by TfGM.

They have used their resources to create a completely new service at high frequency and capacity where none existed before (e.g. Chorlton), to increase the quality, speed and capacity of an existing service, and riase its profile by moving the stops to more convenient locations (e.g. Oldham and Rochdale) and to support some very large free park and ride sites (e.g. East Didsbury, Ladywell, Derker). The development of the new route to the Trafford Centre is primarily about creating new capacity too, it is not intended to replace the bus services and has been designed carefully not to reduce road capacity too much.

Their principle is about trying to move car drivers onto trams. This is what they are trying to do with the Trafford Centre and what they have tried to do with people who park in the city centre quite effectively until now.

These opportunities just don't really exist with the Oxford Road corridor. I am sure they would love to take control of the services on the corridor, and this may yet be a possibility. But conversion to tramway does not really fit with their aims, and funding is very limited.

A route to Middleton, which currently has quite poor links to anywhere, is hopefully more likely.

Instead, my view is that the Oxford Road corridor could do with an extension to its bus and permit holders only section. It could also do with fewer buses which are better loaded, as they'd be more reliable and there would be less air pollution concentrated along the corridor.

Finally, it has been my view for a while that the best way to support development of Metrolink would be to grant the local authority the power to charge a city tax on parking spaces in Central Manchester. They could use this money to double deck more car parks at their existing sites, and to ensure that all of their existing car parks remain free.
 

Bletchleyite

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What would the destination be? Didsbury or Wythenshawe would be the most likely

Parrs Wood interchange seems the obvious one for bus connections, Tesco and the leisure park (then down to alongside the existing line and station). It's not about the terminus, it's about "along the way". Not sure about the 43 route off the top of my head, though looking at an OS map that side of things is already reasonably well served by other Metrolink lines.

I can't see this being feasible, mostly because there's no opportunity for off-street running and most of Wilmslow Road isn't wide enough to support tram and car traffic and has too frequent crossroads.

I'd suggest barring motor vehicles except for access.
 
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Greybeard33

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In an urban setting it's also very bad for pollution and I bet the occupancy isn't high on average so combined with relatively small vehicles it's a poor use of personnel as well as road space. If it's so busy as to 'self congest' at times so journey times become unreliable, it's a poor transport solution for the corridor. Greybeard 33 notes the effect the nose to tail bus traffic on Oxford Rd has on journey time for the main-east west Metrolink corridor at its intersection. High frequency can be an attractive attribute, but taken to extremes can be self defeating. London's Oxford Street is similar in this respect with its famous red wall, although TfL are attempting to demolish that, without much help from the City of Westminster.
Most of the buses on Oxford Road turn off down Portland Street rather than continuing on to Oxford Street. It is mainly general traffic, not buses, that conflicts with Metrolink at the Oxford Street intersection. Oxford Street is a major thoroughfare.
The junction would be on the busiest section of Metrolink and is mentioned above as the most severe bottleneck on the system. So running to Oxford Road would have to be at the expense of running somewhere else, and because of the extra junction conflict it might mean fewer trams through St Peters Square in total.
^^ Fully agree. The present arrangement of bus routes and Metrolink lines maximises public transport capacity through the city centre, with a minimum of conflicts between modes.

Bus franchising could enable TfGM to regulate frequency on Oxford Road to match demand, reducing congestion. Battery hybrid buses can further reduce pollution.
 

Bletchleyite

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Bus franchising could enable TfGM to regulate frequency on Oxford Road to match demand, reducing congestion. Battery hybrid buses can further reduce pollution.

There would certainly be a significant improvement were it reduced to 2 routes (42 to Parrs Wood and some to Stockport, 43 to Northenden, perhaps onwards to a purpose built interchange facility at one of the Wythenshawe Metrolink line stations) and operated using articulated, maybe double-articulated, buses with 3 sets of doors, open boarding and "touch in" contactless payment as well as full electric operation.
 

Greybeard33

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I'm not sure I agree on capacity. If a double tram was used on all services (why don't Metrolink just order a 4-car variant?) and they operated every 5 minutes I'd say capacity would be quite adequate. The buses by and large aren't actually full.
TfGM might order some double length trams in future. But 56m long vehicles are not well suited to the lines that share road space with general traffic (Eccles, Ashton, Airport). They are too unwieldy and take an excessive time to traverse intersections.

The Metrolink working timetable is built around 6 minute headways because 10tphpd is the maximum frequency that the single line section through Navigation Road can support reliably.

Once the Trafford Park line is operational and the frequency on the Airport line is increased to 10tph, the frequency through St Peters Square will be 45tphpd, which is the theoretical maximum capacity of the Oxford Street road intersection.
 

Bletchleyite

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TfGM might order some double length trams in future. But 56m long vehicles are not well suited to the lines that share road space with general traffic (Eccles, Ashton, Airport). They are too unwieldy and take an excessive time to traverse intersections.

Yet other cities use longer trams for street tramways - most notably Nottingham and Edinburgh, the latter are *very* long.
 

edwin_m

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Yet other cities use longer trams for street tramways - most notably Nottingham and Edinburgh, the latter are *very* long.
The Nottingham trams are 32m and 33m long according to Wikipedia, so not much more than the 29m-ish of a Metrolink. They are however formed of more sections, which may give the impression that they are longer.

Metrolink tram-trains would have to be longer than that to accommodate the necessary equipment, so couldn't run as doubles except for vehicle rescue. To maximise capacity they would probably be about the length of a double tram. These would replace pairs of trams or augment capacity on the busier routes, with plenty of singles in the existing fleet for non-tram-train routes that don't justify a double.
 

Bletchleyite

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Edinburgh appear to be 42.8m so I stand corrected. But Manchester could use a tram of a similar length operating singly, all it needs is not to be (physically) is longer than a double, and of course there will be about 5m or so which isn't wasted on intermediate couplers and cabs.
 

61653 HTAFC

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With regard to congestion between trams themselves (such as at St. Peters Square) I wonder how cities like Prague cope, with a far more extensive tram network than Manchester... The answer is, surprisingly well. This with a varied fleet of vehicles and far less segregated track. There's also surprisingly little conflict with other road traffic despite largely shared alignments, and road vehicles trying to enter tram-only sections is also rare.

Perhaps it's a cultural thing, few people alive in Prague today will remember a time before the trams.
 

dggar

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There would certainly be a significant improvement were it reduced to 2 routes (42 to Parrs Wood and some to Stockport, 43 to Northenden, perhaps onwards to a purpose built interchange facility at one of the Wythenshawe Metrolink line stations) and operated using articulated, maybe double-articulated, buses with 3 sets of doors, open boarding and "touch in" contactless payment as well as full electric operation.

Such as Manchester Airport?
 

Greybeard33

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Edinburgh appear to be 42.8m so I stand corrected. But Manchester could use a tram of a similar length operating singly, all it needs is not to be (physically) is longer than a double, and of course there will be about 5m or so which isn't wasted on intermediate couplers and cabs.
Trams with multiple short articulations, like the Edinburgh Urbos, are optimised for "streetcar" type systems, rather than segregated light rail like Metrolink. They typically have axle-less fixed bogies to give a 100% low floor saloon. The trade-off is worse ride quality and lower top speed than a conventional or Jacobs bogie. The Edinburgh vehicles are limited to 70km/h, versus 80km/h for the Manchester M5000s and 100km/h for most tram-trains.

This type of tram would be inappropriate for the high floor/high platform Metrolink system.
 
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MarkyT

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Trams with multiple short articulations, like the Edinburgh Urbos, are optimised for "streetcar" type systems, rather than segregated light rail like Metrolink. They typically have axle-less fixed bogies to give a 100% low floor saloon. The trade-off is worse ride quality and lower top speed than a conventional or Jacobs bogie. The Edinburgh vehicles are limited to 70km/h, versus 90km/h for the Manchester M5000s and 100km/h for most tram-trains.

This type of tram would be inappropriate for the high floor/high platform Metrolink system.
True but there could plausibly be a second network of low floor trams in Manchester on the Oxford Road corridor and elsewhere that did not interrun with the existing high floor network. The low floor network would perhaps be more 'street based' with more closely spaced stops and not go out so far from the city centre as the high floor trams. Much of the same could be achieved with large articulated electric buses and improved priority measures. Edge city interchanges for a wider feeder bus network could be established for either with through, inter-available ticketing.
 

Ianno87

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Might you have the problem that there wouldn't be adequate capacity from the south via either 1CC or 2CC with other commitements/likely schemes (+5tph Trafford Park, +5tph Airport Western loop)?
 

B&I

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With regard to congestion between trams themselves (such as at St. Peters Square) I wonder how cities like Prague cope, with a far more extensive tram network than Manchester... The answer is, surprisingly well. This with a varied fleet of vehicles and far less segregated track. There's also surprisingly little conflict with other road traffic despite largely shared alignments, and road vehicles trying to enter tram-only sections is also rare.

Perhaps it's a cultural thing, few people alive in Prague today will remember a time before the trams.


Or maybe the Czechs are more inclined to overcome problems than we are,, rather than ysing every possible excuse we can not to do anything
 

PR1Berske

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Or maybe the Czechs are more inclined to overcome problems than we are,, rather than ysing every possible excuse we can not to do anything
Maybe the Czechs have wider roads than central Manchester?
 

Bletchleyite

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Trams with multiple short articulations, like the Edinburgh Urbos, are optimised for "streetcar" type systems, rather than segregated light rail like Metrolink. They typically have axle-less fixed bogies to give a 100% low floor saloon. The trade-off is worse ride quality and lower top speed than a conventional or Jacobs bogie. The Edinburgh vehicles are limited to 70km/h, versus 90km/h for the Manchester M5000s and 100km/h for most tram-trains.

This type of tram would be inappropriate for the high floor/high platform Metrolink system.

It would, but I see no particular reason why there couldn't be a 4-car version (three articulations, or even conventional bogies in the middle) of the present tram. One with 3 articulations would be a bit shorter than the present double tram by virtue of less wasted space.
 

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It would, but I see no particular reason why there couldn't be a 4-car version (three articulations, or even conventional bogies in the middle) of the present tram. One with 3 articulations would be a bit shorter than the present double tram by virtue of less wasted space.
But you'll have an empty tram when it's quiet.
 
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