True. It might be a useful loop in the long term, when Metrolink (hopefully) has a decent selection of radial lines from Manchester to outlying towns and an orbital line in outer GM, but not yet.
Could continue to Pendleton shopping centre via Salford Central, Cathedral and Crescent. And from there possibly join onto the Atherton line or take over the V1/V2 busway, but I’m getting really far fetched now.
I imagine also given that the first line ran from Bury to Altrincham with a spur to Piccadilly, the fact it used converted heavy rail stations that it was much cheaper to have high floors otherwise every former station would have had to be demolished and replaced with lower platforms.
I think that was it. The stations with high-level platforms were already there, there weren't at the start going to be that many new stations on the road sections, and it was thus cheaper, quicker, and easier to build the system for high-level access. The fact that the second section was the Altrincham line simply strengthened this position. With hindsight, I think a great opportunity was lost.
I don't think it's necessarily more effective, but it certainly can be — but only if the trams have a good route on the surface and have full running priority over the road sections. They are visible and they have quick and easy access, and they certainly feel much safer than a genuine underground can, especially at quiet times. And compare the lack of hassle using a major tram interchange in any number of continental cities with the time spent in seemingly endless subterranean walking at somewhere like King's Cross.
PiccVic was very much a local trains solution that would have done nothing for through-Manchester routes for N/S or E/W traffic. The connection at the Victoria end was into the Bury electric line; Bolton was to be reached not over the main line but by way of Radcliffe. What seems hardly ever to be mentioned but what would have been a major benefit now is that the plans did include flyovers at both Edgeley Junction and Slade Lane Junction.
You mention Bolton, I find the East-West link isn't too bad other than always having to change at Victoria or Stalybridge towards Huddersfield/Leeds, it's squeezing through the Castlefield Corridor that's a real problem, example, if you have a flight or train to catch at Piccadilly, I would advise, if possible, catching an earlier one from Preston/Chorley/Bolton to counter any delays there. Much more confident of catching a connection at Victoria!
This is the big problem with Metrolink. In the short term this can be mitigated with more double trams but long term there is going to be capacity issues on the trams and at city centre stops. There's very little that can be done to the existing system given space constraints, particularly when any adaptions to existing stops is going to require track modifications which will be extremely disruptive. A new line is going to be needed in the city centre and another surface line is likely to be politically difficult and cause significant disruption to other modes of transport.
However, the Oldham line stations were totally replaced with new (high) platforms when converted to Metrolink, so perhaps the extra cost of doing so wasn't too great - especially when considering the ongoing maintenance costs of a range of heritage structures instead of a uniform set of simple modern ones.
By replacing the Altrincham heavy rail service, Metrolink did free up capacity in the Castlefield Corridor for through trains between the Airport or Stockport lines and the Bolton or Liverpool.
Are you saying that the stretch of London Road (A6) immediately outside of the Piccadilly Metrolink station isn't camera monitored /enforced? It is essentially a long yellow box junction, isnt it?
A stretched M5000 would have more articulations, but the current design only has motors on the non-articulated bogie. So it would need a new design of motored articulation bogie. I suspect at that point, and considering the age of the M5000 design, it would be better to go out to tender for something new and accept the likelihood of a different design with little or no commonality. Operationally they will have a split fleet whatever they do.
