Hi Marty, I am really wondering how this line will work as a metro line. The whole idea of a metro line is have the stations at a further distance apart to allow the metro pick up speed. However, the Bankstown line and stations were originally made for standard trains.They are promising a faster service with the metro, but how can that be done with stopping at all those ten stations? A scary thought, but could there be a possibility of sometime in the future that some of those stations between Sydenham and Bankstown be completely closed down permanently? This would certainly get the metro up to speed, though that would also cause problems for anyone living near any of those closed stations. It is certainly something to think about. If they ever decide to extend the metro from Bankstown to Lidcolme, they may have problems with the current situation, though that could certainly work a bit better for the people living between Bankstown and Lidcolme. Anyway, take care. Rob in Melbourne Australia.
Having travelled along the Bankstown line a few times recently - by train and by car.. some stations are very close to each other agree!... you can see the next one from the other one in some cases (although not as close as some I recall on the Paris Metro). Yes if extended to Lidcombe I am sure they would have to build parallel metro tracks beside the Sydney Train lines.. that Sydney Trains link would still be needed by the network. Cheers.
@@just_passing_throughThe Days of long delays due to Industrial Actions is now a thing of the past. As Rail Unions now have very little leverage to bargain with. The Manipulation of the Rail System by Unions, to plead poverty for more Gov Tax Dollars is also gone. The power of the transportation network is now with the people, the public & not the dictators of the rail union & it's workers.
Luckily with the metro west we won't be experiencing any closures as it's entirely separate from the existing infrastructure (we still have 8 years to go however)
The current station at Bankstown is intended to be temporary until Metro eventually extends to Liverpool. When that happens a permanent station would be built underground at Bankstown
Still got the issues of the T1/T9 running together, and the 2 branches of T2 running with both the T3 into the City and T5 west & South of Granville all scrambling over the top of each other. T1 also shares track with the T5. It's all still a mess, though significantly better with Bankstown gone.
Thank you for the video. 👍 but I'm still scratching my head over this Metro conversion Why? So it means that between Sydenham and Bankstown there is only a Metro and no backup regular train line(s) and that you can't get directly from Central to Lidcombe anymorr without transferring at Bankstown from the Metro to a train or bus service? Will it actually decrease travel times? There seems to be missing links with the Metrolines everywhere. Are there or am I incorrect? I think we should bring back and recycle the monorail and connect it with the Metroline to fill the gaps
Yes, that’s right. You can’t get to Lidcombe via Bankstown without changing from the Metro to heavy rail. Which also means if there’s an issue on the Western Mainline trains can’t get to Parramatta now via Bankstown. There is still a metropolitan freight line but that is not electrified so regular suburban trains could not travel along that.
The metro is a game changer - I die inside when I have to change to trains. I know this gonna be a painful year for those impacted but my goodness is the end reward sweet
Yeah for sure, and the thing is hypothetically if we want to convert more lines to Metro there wouldn't be anywhere near as much disruption. Illawarra line for example has 4 tracks from the City to Hurstville, so conversion could be done to Hurstville on one pair of tracks whilst trains continue to run and serve the other pair, whilst the Eastern Suburbs Railway is already getting digital signalling so wouldn't need as much shutdown work would not be as bad and might be able to be done much faster with platform screen doors installed over smaller shutdown weekends like Paris did. The Inner West line has 6 tracks from Homebush to the City and 4 tracks from Granville to Homebush, so other than the stations between Ashfield-Macdonaldtown most services could run as normal plus Metro West would be open by the time you wanted to convert the Inner West line to Metro. The Airport line tunnels would be a pain but they are new (built in 1999) so wouldn't be as difficult or as long to convert, and there are 4 tracks from Wolli Creek to Revesby so Campbelltown trains can still run via Sydenham into the City. The North Shore Line could be done in stages either side of Chatswood and the Pacific Highway has 6 lanes so you can take 2 for buses and people can change to Metro at Chatswood. The Southwest Rail Link would be trivial in comparison.
Paris metro line 1 has levels of ridership that Sydney can only dream of and was converted from steel to rubber wheels in the 1960s without closures, and again to install platform screens and doors and automatic operation without closures. Says a lot about Australia's approach to customer service.
Only one issue with that. It would require the T4 and south coast line to instead go through the city circle if the eastern suburbs line is converted to metro. Basically undoing the work that metro southwest is doing by removing the T3 from the city circle
@@electro_sykes South Coast line will be terminating at Sydney Terminal when the new major timetable change goes into effect in 2025 anyway, that's what they have planned for. There is stacks of spare capacity for terminating extra trains at Central, and all T4 & South Coast SCO passengers from south of Hurstville would have the option to change to Metro at Hurstville or Sydenham and potentially Wolli Creek as well if they built another set of platforms and did a grade separation on the junction there. Longer-term then you would build a new bypass tunnel from Waterfall to Kogarah via Miranda that would allow express trains to zoom through at 160kph (or more in future with faster trains) and those passengers would have a much faster trip, allowing that T4 Metro to take over the whole of the T4 to Cronulla.
It reduces dwell times and allows trains to accelerate faster meaning that you can run trains more frequently. There’s a reason why single decker trains are standard on metro systems all around the world.
Double decked rollingstock can have its advantages. but it also has its downsides. One thing worth mentioning is that crowding in the vestibule DD trains causes a lot of delays and slows down loading and unloading. of trains. The stairs are also kinda dead space and can’t really hold many passengers safely while the train’s in motion, so they reduce standing area,, which reduces effective capacity by a lot. The net result. of that is you can’t run trains as close together as might otherwise be possible. now, for the Interurban runs I think DD does make an awful lot of sense. Winthin the Sydney basin this is less so however. Also ,the metro rollingstock. is able to have abn additional door per pcarriage per side, which further improves loading and unloading times. A third door on DD stock, while it has been done with some RER stock, means you lose seating capacity and again, stairs cause slower loaiding and unloading. Any loss in capcity per train (which will be minimal anyway) will be well offset by the ability to run far more trains (and they will be running more. iirc the plan is for trains every 4 mins in peak. Also while the metro trains are 6 car now, they can be extended to 8 car in future since they’re using the same car length as existing rollingstock and all the stations , new and converted , are capable of working with 8 car units.
@@SamSitar With a Faster system delays are minimised. Which decreases numbers waiting & increases delivery. Hence why, there's no requirement for a double deck system.
cant help but feel this was some sort of second best option because of politics and pushback about creating a new alignment for the metro but maybe this is the best way to go about it if the main goal was to take traffic from the city loop and stick it in the new metro tunnels?
They looked at many options and decided the Bankstown conversion with future extension to Liverpool direct was the best and offered the most going forwards because of what it allowed you to do for the T2, T4 and T8 and the fact you could squeeze a lot of development out of the corridor.
Cannot understand why they are doing this. They could have invested the money on an underground (shorter line) towards Maroubra/la perouse...a densely populated area, which is perfect for metro. The reason of 'releiving Circle line was needed' can be achieved many other (cheaper) ways...
I worked on the Chatswood-Sydenham section and would love to hear your suggestions, the team looking at the Bankstown Line conversion surveiled a bunch of options. Worth noting cheaper is not the same as better or more sensible or even adequate.
I think they may have done better converting the airport line into a metro, rather than Sydenham to Bankstown. For starters, the airport line is far newer and would cause far less problems when converting. I think the Maroubra and La Perouse problem could be solved with an extension to the Randwick Light Rail, using some of the former reservation along Anzac Parade, which the old trams used back before the original system closed in February 1961.
@@RGC198 If you actually read the Reports they looked at airport line conversion and decided against it because there are curved platforms anyway, less scope for new development, you needed a new site for stabling, and it didnt provide the same capacity lift for the rest of the network. Airport Line can still get its own Metro though, I have seen people suggest that the Metro West should be extended through the Airport Line.
The end of a Legacy & the beginning of a new frontier in public transportation. Highspeed, automated rail. Its a no excuse transit system a symbol of what state of the art machinary & computing can achieve. Its a great step away from the traditional method & a giant leap into the future, a new statndard with amazing potential. While this evolution of rail is making its mark in Sydney, those who have experienced the Metro all agree on one thing, now that we have it. We cant live without it.
@@yesand5536 people saying Metro sucks have no idea, the current Metro Line is still only operating at a fraction of its ultimate capability and it is already the busiest line in Australia before even a smidgeon of the development has been unlocked along the line.
@@sirfoxington2258 Nonsense, nothing cheap or low-quality about it. The only loud section imo is Barangaroo to Martin Place because those are some hefty curves and the trains run them way quicker than anything else in Australia.
@@BackTracks.SideTracked Longer term plans have a circle metro from Kogarah interchanging at Bankstown before heading north to Parramatta and Norwest. Obviously this was under the previous government and it’s all hypothetical now. The ideal scenario would be a station box for two lines. This is from the Future Transport Strategy 2056.
Hi Marty, I am really wondering how this line will work as a metro line. The whole idea of a metro line is have the stations at a further distance apart to allow the metro pick up speed. However, the Bankstown line and stations were originally made for standard trains.They are promising a faster service with the metro, but how can that be done with stopping at all those ten stations? A scary thought, but could there be a possibility of sometime in the future that some of those stations between Sydenham and Bankstown be completely closed down permanently? This would certainly get the metro up to speed, though that would also cause problems for anyone living near any of those closed stations. It is certainly something to think about. If they ever decide to extend the metro from Bankstown to Lidcolme, they may have problems with the current situation, though that could certainly work a bit better for the people living between Bankstown and Lidcolme. Anyway, take care. Rob in Melbourne Australia.
Having travelled along the Bankstown line a few times recently - by train and by car.. some stations are very close to each other agree!... you can see the next one from the other one in some cases (although not as close as some I recall on the Paris Metro). Yes if extended to Lidcombe I am sure they would have to build parallel metro tracks beside the Sydney Train lines.. that Sydney Trains link would still be needed by the network. Cheers.
I must be getting old as I feel a personal sense of loss with the closure/transformation of this line.
Which line will be next?
@@just_passing_throughThe Days of long delays due to Industrial Actions is now a thing of the past. As Rail Unions now have very little leverage to bargain with. The Manipulation of the Rail System by Unions, to plead poverty for more Gov Tax Dollars is also gone. The power of the transportation network is now with the people, the public & not the dictators of the rail union & it's workers.
And when they take one perfectly good line off the city circle line they add another line that’s orange into the city circle. Great planning
Luckily with the metro west we won't be experiencing any closures as it's entirely separate from the existing infrastructure (we still have 8 years to go however)
If it’s extended to Liverpool a station box will be constructed to the south and the metro will dive into a tunnel to the east.
The current station at Bankstown is intended to be temporary until Metro eventually extends to Liverpool. When that happens a permanent station would be built underground at Bankstown
How can it take 12 months to re do a line that already exists?
Because Station platforms are being rebuilt with platform doors, signalling and track replaced to meet Metro standards.
Interesting
gosh i hope its all worth it.
This is probably our best (and only) chance to sectorise the rail network in the CBD, so let’s hope it goes well.
Still got the issues of the T1/T9 running together, and the 2 branches of T2 running with both the T3 into the City and T5 west & South of Granville all scrambling over the top of each other. T1 also shares track with the T5. It's all still a mess, though significantly better with Bankstown gone.
Thank you for the video. 👍 but I'm still scratching my head over this Metro conversion Why? So it means that between Sydenham and Bankstown there is only a Metro and no backup regular train line(s) and that you can't get directly from Central to Lidcombe anymorr without transferring at Bankstown from the Metro to a train or bus service? Will it actually decrease travel times? There seems to be missing links with the Metrolines everywhere. Are there or am I incorrect?
I think we should bring back and recycle the monorail and connect it with the Metroline to fill the gaps
Yes, that’s right. You can’t get to Lidcombe via Bankstown without changing from the Metro to heavy rail.
Which also means if there’s an issue on the Western Mainline trains can’t get to Parramatta now via Bankstown. There is still a metropolitan freight line but that is not electrified so regular suburban trains could not travel along that.
The metro is a game changer - I die inside when I have to change to trains. I know this gonna be a painful year for those impacted but my goodness is the end reward sweet
Yeah for sure, and the thing is hypothetically if we want to convert more lines to Metro there wouldn't be anywhere near as much disruption. Illawarra line for example has 4 tracks from the City to Hurstville, so conversion could be done to Hurstville on one pair of tracks whilst trains continue to run and serve the other pair, whilst the Eastern Suburbs Railway is already getting digital signalling so wouldn't need as much shutdown work would not be as bad and might be able to be done much faster with platform screen doors installed over smaller shutdown weekends like Paris did. The Inner West line has 6 tracks from Homebush to the City and 4 tracks from Granville to Homebush, so other than the stations between Ashfield-Macdonaldtown most services could run as normal plus Metro West would be open by the time you wanted to convert the Inner West line to Metro. The Airport line tunnels would be a pain but they are new (built in 1999) so wouldn't be as difficult or as long to convert, and there are 4 tracks from Wolli Creek to Revesby so Campbelltown trains can still run via Sydenham into the City. The North Shore Line could be done in stages either side of Chatswood and the Pacific Highway has 6 lanes so you can take 2 for buses and people can change to Metro at Chatswood. The Southwest Rail Link would be trivial in comparison.
Paris metro line 1 has levels of ridership that Sydney can only dream of and was converted from steel to rubber wheels in the 1960s without closures, and again to install platform screens and doors and automatic operation without closures. Says a lot about Australia's approach to customer service.
@@jack2453 Conversion of Paris Metro Line 1 also took 4 years.
Only one issue with that. It would require the T4 and south coast line to instead go through the city circle if the eastern suburbs line is converted to metro. Basically undoing the work that metro southwest is doing by removing the T3 from the city circle
@@electro_sykes South Coast line will be terminating at Sydney Terminal when the new major timetable change goes into effect in 2025 anyway, that's what they have planned for. There is stacks of spare capacity for terminating extra trains at Central, and all T4 & South Coast SCO passengers from south of Hurstville would have the option to change to Metro at Hurstville or Sydenham and potentially Wolli Creek as well if they built another set of platforms and did a grade separation on the junction there. Longer-term then you would build a new bypass tunnel from Waterfall to Kogarah via Miranda that would allow express trains to zoom through at 160kph (or more in future with faster trains) and those passengers would have a much faster trip, allowing that T4 Metro to take over the whole of the T4 to Cronulla.
downgrading a line from double deck to single deck confuses me.
It reduces dwell times and allows trains to accelerate faster meaning that you can run trains more frequently. There’s a reason why single decker trains are standard on metro systems all around the world.
Double decked rollingstock can have its advantages. but it also has its downsides. One thing worth mentioning is that crowding in the vestibule DD trains causes a lot of delays and slows down loading and unloading. of trains. The stairs are also kinda dead space and can’t really hold many passengers safely while the train’s in motion, so they reduce standing area,, which reduces effective capacity by a lot. The net result. of that is you can’t run trains as close together as might otherwise be possible. now, for the Interurban runs I think DD does make an awful lot of sense. Winthin the Sydney basin this is less so however. Also ,the metro rollingstock. is able to have abn additional door per pcarriage per side, which further improves loading and unloading times. A third door on DD stock, while it has been done with some RER stock, means you lose seating capacity and again, stairs cause slower loaiding and unloading. Any loss in capcity per train (which will be minimal anyway) will be well offset by the ability to run far more trains (and they will be running more. iirc the plan is for trains every 4 mins in peak. Also while the metro trains are 6 car now, they can be extended to 8 car in future since they’re using the same car length as existing rollingstock and all the stations , new and converted , are capable of working with 8 car units.
Thanks for the share. Good insight. Cheers M
@@SamSitar With a Faster system delays are minimised. Which decreases numbers waiting & increases delivery. Hence why, there's no requirement for a double deck system.
It’s a massive upgrade. Faster, safer and with more services.
cant help but feel this was some sort of second best option because of politics and pushback about creating a new alignment for the metro
but maybe this is the best way to go about it if the main goal was to take traffic from the city loop and stick it in the new metro tunnels?
They looked at many options and decided the Bankstown conversion with future extension to Liverpool direct was the best and offered the most going forwards because of what it allowed you to do for the T2, T4 and T8 and the fact you could squeeze a lot of development out of the corridor.
“Closed”…
…for a year whilst it gets upgraded to a much better metro line.
As of today closed is a better word than closes. appreciate it.
Let's hope that it can all be done in a year. If it all goes into overtime, I would guess that the locals there will not be very happy.
@@RGC198 Yeah okay.
But my point is that this isn’t some bolt from the blue. This has been planned for almost a decade.
Cannot understand why they are doing this. They could have invested the money on an underground (shorter line) towards Maroubra/la perouse...a densely populated area, which is perfect for metro.
The reason of 'releiving Circle line was needed' can be achieved many other (cheaper) ways...
I worked on the Chatswood-Sydenham section and would love to hear your suggestions, the team looking at the Bankstown Line conversion surveiled a bunch of options. Worth noting cheaper is not the same as better or more sensible or even adequate.
You sound like someone who would turn the entire T3 into a shuttle
I think they may have done better converting the airport line into a metro, rather than Sydenham to Bankstown. For starters, the airport line is far newer and would cause far less problems when converting. I think the Maroubra and La Perouse problem could be solved with an extension to the Randwick Light Rail, using some of the former reservation along Anzac Parade, which the old trams used back before the original system closed in February 1961.
@@RGC198 If you actually read the Reports they looked at airport line conversion and decided against it because there are curved platforms anyway, less scope for new development, you needed a new site for stabling, and it didnt provide the same capacity lift for the rest of the network. Airport Line can still get its own Metro though, I have seen people suggest that the Metro West should be extended through the Airport Line.
The end of a Legacy & the beginning of a new frontier in public transportation. Highspeed, automated rail. Its a no excuse transit system a symbol of what state of the art machinary & computing can achieve. Its a great step away from the traditional method & a giant leap into the future, a new statndard with amazing potential. While this evolution of rail is making its mark in Sydney, those who have experienced the Metro all agree on one thing, now that we have it. We cant live without it.
Can you glaze it any more?
Who cares?
Metro sucks
Really? So when you have to ride on it at Barangaroo or Crows Nest or Castle Hill, you go "this sucks!"..
@@yesand5536 people saying Metro sucks have no idea, the current Metro Line is still only operating at a fraction of its ultimate capability and it is already the busiest line in Australia before even a smidgeon of the development has been unlocked along the line.
Metro is in fact absolutly awesome and there needs to be loads more
Mixed feelings. It just feels very very cheap in terms of quality. And it’s also hecking loud on the inside in tunnels.
@@sirfoxington2258 Nonsense, nothing cheap or low-quality about it. The only loud section imo is Barangaroo to Martin Place because those are some hefty curves and the trains run them way quicker than anything else in Australia.
If it’s extended to Liverpool a station box will be constructed to the south and the metro will dive into a tunnel to the east.
Thanks. Yes that could the be plan. Shame then possibly not to use the new Bankstown metro station that would be relatively new.
@@BackTracks.SideTracked Longer term plans have a circle metro from Kogarah interchanging at Bankstown before heading north to Parramatta and Norwest. Obviously this was under the previous government and it’s all hypothetical now. The ideal scenario would be a station box for two lines. This is from the Future Transport Strategy 2056.
The current metro platforms at Bankstown are only intended to be temporary until it’s expanded to Liverpool. Then a new station box will be built