[sustran] Re: More on UK Funding switch from Light Rail to Busway

[Brendan Finn]

Dear Eric,

I would offer the following in response to your perspective. I keep it
specific to the Dublin LRT case so anyone can take it or leave it based on
the single case study :

Dublin will open two LRT lines later this year. Only covering operating
costs (which is the OPTIMISTIC scenario) means that there is no contribution
to the 700+ million euro investment, no contribution to track and system
maintenance, no contribution to customer facing services, and no
contribution to system development. That is a lot of public money now, and
continuing indefinitely into the future. Dublin currently has a peak fleet
requirement of about 900 large buses, covers about 75% of its total costs
(including investment). It carries about 85% of the city's public transport
movements, the balance being mostly the suburban heavy rail network.

The specific LRT alignments are not any better than the Quality Bus Network
(QBN) ones, nor is the forecast operating speed of the LRT particularly
better than the best of the QBNs. The two LRT lines will not intersect, and
they will not be able to run on the suburban rail tracks. Therefore, they
are simply two independent lines.

Your points in turn :

1) Dublin still has an effective public monopoly on passenger transport.
Wages are not low, unions are strong, and labour costs are a significant
factor.

2) I do not think there is the same flexibility for modern tram systems,
where they are normally integrated 2- or 3-car sets. I have seen in Poland
and Russia where single car trams operate instead of 2-car or 3-car, but
this is always dropping a car rather than an ability to exploit cheap extra
capacity. Besides, in Dublin the issue is more likely to be one of reaching
a viable level of demand (unless the bus services are decimated to force
mode transfer). Are you mixing here the characteristics of heavy/suburban
rail and light rail ?

3) One of the LRT lines is on a disused rail line, the other on an alignment
which has been preserved for more than 20 years for a busway. Thus, the cost
savings have already been achieved. I dread to think of the cost and the
delays if the land had to be bought from scratch.

4) No tunnels on this one. Originally there should have been one at St.
Stephen's Green (where one LRT line will now terminate) but they eventually
decided against it on cost grounds, so now it does not connect with the
second line. There is one modest span bridge at Dundrum, replacing the old
rail bridge that was pulled down in the 60's. Nothing special in engineering
terms, it's basically just a flyover, although it looks quite nice.

The QBN uses existing streetspace, with some minor traffic engineering works
and junction realignment. Total cost for a few hundred km. is about 80
million Euro. It has the double effect of prioritising the bus services, and
restricting the space available to cars on the key arteries at operational
hours (normally 0700-1900, Mon-Sat). Since there is no physical separation,
the road space is available outside those hours, and can be used in
emergency.

5) Enforcement of bus lanes has been patchy since they were introduced here
in 1981, but has greatly improved since the QBN concept. Generally, it is
not a problem. Bus lanes which actually have buses in them are usually
self-enforcing. BTW, taxis with passengers are also allowed to use them, as
are cyclists - except for contraflow lanes, which are bus only. Almost all
the QBN has reasonable bus flows throughout the day, although there are a
few that I would question. People don't often park in bus lanes during
operational hours, and delivery trucks have also got the message since it's
very visible what you are doing.

The big upside of no separation is cost and speed of implementation, the
ability to squeeze a third lane out of a two lane street, and the
flexibility of the use of the road. The big downside is the guy with two
wheels on or over the white line. But generally it works.

6) The "continuous wall" of buses has not yet been a phenomenon to worry the
good folk of Dublin. On the Stillorgan Road QBC (QB Corridor) they average
about 1 per minute. At the moment, the high level of on-bus ticketing, lack
of automatic priority at traffic signals, and need for some redesign of bus
stopping places place a yet-unreached upper limit, but getting these factors
right will allow a quite significant increase in throughput. I'd
particularly like to see more express or limited-stop services - there are
currently licencing restrictions on these - and this would greatly
facilitate the outlying and developing areas.

Again, are you mixing the characteristics of heavy and light rail ? This
thread began specifically on light-rail and busway. I don't understand the
reference to pedestrians. Since most bus users arrive/leave the stop on
foot, it would be rather silly not to properly accommodate pedestrians.

7) In the Dublin case, there are no obvious system-wide v/ modal operating
cost benefits. The two LRT lines are stand-alone. The bus services actually
serve places along the arteries as well as performing line-haul. For the 750
million euro it's cost us (so far) we could replace the entire Dublin bus
fleet twice (2 by 1,000 buses at 200,000 euro) over a 25-year period,
implement the QBN (80 million), capital finance a fleet of 2,000 small buses
four times (short life) for large-scale DRT (4 by 2,000 by 30,000 euro) and
still have the price of integrated ticketing and AVM left over. These
services would all be profitable or marginal excluding investment costs.

BTW, I wear by left-wing colours on my sleeve. Where I live and in the
countries I work, funding for public purposes is hard enough to come by, and
to hold on to. The financial viability of services means you can do an awful
lot more with the available funds.

Footnote : In Ireland, a lot of us had to fight very hard to get funding for
local rural services. Eventually in 2001 the Govt. made about 4 million euro
available for the Rural Transport Initiative. This was disbursed to 35
different community organisations who each got many local and flexible
mobility services going in all corners of Ireland. It was highly successful
in giving mobility to people previously dependent on lift-giving. The Govt.
is now quietly cutting back that funding. The capital cost alone of the LRT
could have kept such a scheme going for 200 years.

As I say, this information is specific to Dublin, maybe it is irrelevant
anywhere else.

With best wishes,


Brendan Finn.
_______________________________________________________________________
Contact details are : e-mail : etts at indigo.ie   tel : +353.87.2530286
----- Original Message -----
From: "Eric Bruun" <ericbruun at earthlink.net>
To: "Asia and the Pacific sustainable transport"
<sustran-discuss at list.jca.apc.org>
Sent: Thursday, April 29, 2004 10:10 PM
Subject: [sustran] More on UK Funding switch from Light Rail to Busway


>
>
> Dear Sustran readers:
>
> Covering operating costs, even by the definition used in Dublin, would be
> considered an excellent result in most of the richer cities in Europe and
> North America. But this definition of covering operating cost is
> problematic, of I will mention more below.
>
> As I have said before, I support quality bus network additions, but they
are
> not necessarily the equal of rail projects. I don't know the circumstances
> of the specific alignments in Dublin, but here are some considerations
that
> can often makes rail a better alternative:
>
> 1) High labor costs.  If demand is high and service is frequent, then very
> large vehicles cut labor costs. If Dublin is like the UK, operator wages
are
> probably quite low and unions weak or non-existent. In this case labor
costs
> are not as important as in countries where workers are better paid.
>
> 2) High peak to base ratios. Rail vehicles can have their rakes (or
consists
> in North America) lengthened at low marginal cost. Each unit of bus
capacity
> costs the same as the last on busways. The marginal cost for buses (and
old
> fashioned streetcars) actually increases during peak hours if they are in
> mixed traffic operation.
>
> 3) Existing disused rail rights-of-way in decent locations can save a lot
of
> time and money for rail projects.
>
> 4) Where there is no way to avoid tunneling or huge suspension bridges.
Once
> this is necessary, then the cost of rail and electrification may not be
such
> a large incremental increase. Not every large city has the width of
> right-of-way available that the main trunk line of TransMillenio in Bogota
> requires. Creating such a corridor would require the same kind of massive
> dislocation and disruption that motorways require. There also may be
serious
> water crossings.
>
> 5) Lack of enforcement of bus lanes. Rail rights-of-way can be designed to
> deter other vehicles. (Bus rights-of-way can also do this, in theory, but
> there is often much pressure to let other vehicles fill the "empty
space".)
>
> 6) Corridors where development is going to intensify. Even if the demand
is
> met by buses at a reasonable frequency today, there may have to be a
> continuous wall of them in the future. This becomes quite unattractive in
> areas where there are many residences and/or pedestrians. It also means
that
> pedestrians have to be excluded. Fewer rail vehicles providing equal
> capacity at much longer headways might make it possible to keep the
> right-of-way more open.
>
> 7) System operating cost is relevant, not modal operating cost. This is
> where the auditors and right-wing idealogues get it all wrong. In some
> corridors it makes sense to transfer passengers to large trunk vehicles
and
> use the buses for higher frequency local feeders, circulators, and
> tangential connectors. In this way, more service to more
origin-destination
> pairs is offered for an equal operating budget. This is even more true
when
> there are high peak-to-base ratios.
>
> Eric
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Brendan Finn" <etts at indigo.ie>
> To: "Asia and the Pacific sustainable transport"
> <sustran-discuss at list.jca.apc.org>
> Sent: Monday, April 26, 2004 5:40 AM
> Subject: [sustran] Re: UK Funding switch from Light Rail to Busway
>
>
> > For what it's worth :
> >
> > In Dublin we will soon have two new tram/LRT lines in operation. The UK
> > National Audit seems to have triggered a little freedom of information
> here.
> >
> > The Rail Procurement Agency (RPA) has entered into a contract with
CONNEX
> > who will operate the system. We are told that this contract will have a
> > value of 20 million Euro per year. We are also told that the forecast
> > carryings are 20 million passengers per year, and the forecast revenue
> > (collected by RPA) is 20 million Euro per year. Following the UK
National
> > Audit, the RPA has assured us that the forecasting was done to
> > "international standards" - whatever these actually are.
> >
> > The "optimistic" forecast, therefore, is that revenues barely cover
direct
> > operating cost. "Optimistic" means that there is zero contribution to
the
> > 700 million Euro plus investment, zero contribution to the maintenance
> costs
> > (not in the CONNEX contract), zero contribution to customer-facing
> services
> > such as ticketing and information, and zero surplus for future
> development.
> > Incredibly, that's the "optimistic" version based on the "international
> > standard" forecasts.
> >
> > Forgive my cynicism as I point out that the capital investment on these
> two
> > LRT lines is equivalent to 4 years total costs (note : full costs, not
> > subsidy) for the bus network which always has and always will carry the
> vast
> > majority of public transport passengers in Dublin. It is also about 10
> times
> > greater than the extensive and excellent Quality Bus Corridor Network
> which
> > is well under way.
> >
> > Trams are very nice to use, and it was very considerate of previous
> > generations to make the investments for many cities. They are truly a
> legacy
> > to any city. However, transport professionals should maintain their
> > integrity and not pretend either that they make economic sense or that
> they
> > are the most effective mobility solution, especially when compared with
> the
> > very best bus-based alternatives.
> >
> > With best wishes,
> >
> > Brendan Finn.
> > _______________________________________________________________________
> > Contact details are : e-mail : etts at indigo.ie   tel : +353.87.2530286
> > ----- Original Message -----