Edinburgh tram goes live tomorrow!
Discussion
Installation of Metrolink across Manchester in '91-'92 went much more smoothly than the Edinburgh case.
Can't see what was wrong with the old Centreline No.4 bus across Manchester between Piccadilly & Victoria Stations (on which one used one's BR ticket), personally...
And the original Metrolink trams (which ran from Bury into the city then out to Altrincham thus replacing two perfectly reasonable train services) didn't have room for bicycles, either (the old trains did) - now that was progress in public transport terms!
Can't see what was wrong with the old Centreline No.4 bus across Manchester between Piccadilly & Victoria Stations (on which one used one's BR ticket), personally...
And the original Metrolink trams (which ran from Bury into the city then out to Altrincham thus replacing two perfectly reasonable train services) didn't have room for bicycles, either (the old trains did) - now that was progress in public transport terms!
pcvdriver said:
Spitfire2 said:
Eh? What's that big station with tramlines at the airport for?????
It's not quite the airport where the tram Depot is.....just a mile or two away at Gogar (it's nearer RBS headquarters than the airport).0a said:
pcvdriver said:
Spitfire2 said:
Eh? What's that big station with tramlines at the airport for?????
It's not quite the airport where the tram Depot is.....just a mile or two away at Gogar (it's nearer RBS headquarters than the airport).pcvdriver said:
0a said:
pcvdriver said:
Spitfire2 said:
Eh? What's that big station with tramlines at the airport for?????
It's not quite the airport where the tram Depot is.....just a mile or two away at Gogar (it's nearer RBS headquarters than the airport).I am prepared to get shot down in flames for suggesting this, but the only way this route and the money spent to date makes any sort of sense (and I have always been anti-trams) is for the trams to be extended down to Leith and out towards the ERI (and perhaps out to Shawfair/Sherifhall), especially in light of the predicted growth of the city region in the next 10-20 years. What Edinburgh has ended up with is a 3rd of the proposed network at three times the cost. All the transport experts I have listened to have agreed that the route they ended up with is the least desirable, because there is already a rail line which passes both ends of Edinburgh airports main runway and the population (and predicted growth) along the route doesn't merit it. A genuine "head in hands" moment was when I listened to the Councillor in charge of the £1bn project state that he came from a health background and had never overseen a big project before.
A previous poster mentioned the Borders rail link which is another waste of cash. I read an article recently that stated large infrastructure projects require to return a cost benefit ratio of circa 8:1 before they are considered viable - the Borders railway is lucky to return 0.5:1
mini1380cc said:
Widely seen as edinburghs great embarrassment. A complete waste of money and more importantly, a real hindrance to the day to day running of the city centre. I have not spoken to one single fellow resident who will benefit from its existence.
Just to screw residents further they have approved a 20mph vehicle limit in the city, which is a feeble attempt to make alternative transport less appealing. Lesley hinds should be put forward for public trial flogging.
EFAJust to screw residents further they have approved a 20mph vehicle limit in the city, which is a feeble attempt to make alternative transport less appealing. Lesley hinds should be put forward for public
dxg said:
If I recall, wasn't the tram project given the go ahead as a punishment for the city's populace rejecting congestion charging?
Correct.The tram and congestion charge were dreamed up by Transport Initiatives Edinburgh (TIE), which was the council's arm length body set up to "project manage" big transport projects.
The original idea was to build a loop in the north of the city, a line out to the Airport and Ratho and a third line down to the new Edinburgh Royal Infirmary (this one was to be funded by the congestion charge). One of the biggest proponents of a tram in the first place was the SNP's Kenny MacAskill (he of Lockerbie bomber fame). He was the one going around drumming up support for a tram project right up until the planned routes wouldn't serve his Edinburgh Eastern constituency. At that point he and the SNP became virulently hostile to the project.
About 10 years the plan was for a £435 million 3 phase project (a rearranged 2 line plan, not the earlier 3 line plan).
There was also a concurrent plan called EARL to tunnel under the airport to provide an rail link (to Edinburgh, Glasgow and the North).
In 2007 the SNP became the minority government at Holyrood. They planned to cancel the £500 million the Scottish Government was being asked to provide the project (the price having risen to £545). The other parties (Labour, Tory, Lib Dem and Greens) ganged up to force it through against the SNP. Committed to giving the money, the SNP threw their toys out of the pram, prohibiting Transport Scotland (the body that is supposed to oversee transport funding) from having any involvement in the project.
Thus in 2007 the Scottish Government was providing £500m and Edinburgh Council was committed to £45m. This would only be enough for phase 1a (the red section above). They were short about another £45m for Phase 1b so that was put on hold. The planned opening date was to be 2010.
Work started on the project. Steels were ordered for the full length of Phase 1a and 27 trams were ordered for the full three phase service. Rather than do the project incrementally, construction began at once across Phase 1a, including Leith.
Very quickly it was realised that the council's estimate of the utilities diversions required (so that they weren't under the planned tram lines) was out by a factor of two. Contractors quite rightly began asking for extra money (as it was TIE's fault). At one stage the most advanced section was Leith, which wasn't much use as the tram depot was at the other end of the line.
Things came to a head when TIE tried to overcome the utilities delays by getting Bilfinger Berger Siemens (the tram line contractor) to start their work before the utilities diversions were complete. BBS refused as their contract stated the utilities work was to be complete before they began. A rather sensible term considering that some of the utilities work had to be redone as it wasn't up to standard.
TIE began fighting every request for extra money from the contractors as the project increasing went over budget (hardly surprising given the utter balls up TIE had earlier made of the Stirling-Alloa rail line, which Network Rail is now having to substantially rebuild). Eventually work on the project stopped as TIE and the contractors became bogged down in arguments about whether TIE ought to pay changing the project spec. TIE tried to force things by going down the legal route in 2009. That rather backfired on them when the independent arbitrator sided with the contractors on 90% of the issues. Work eventually restarted in 2011.
Meanwhile construction of the 27 trams had proceeded without any issues to the point that the manufacturer wanted to begin deliveries but TIE had nowhere to put them (as the depot wasn't ready). Various ideas were explored including leasing them to other tram lines in the UK. Unfortunately the tram TIE had spec-ed had little in common with UK trams - being larger, longer and heavier. Eventually they just dumped them in a council depot, exposed to the elements.
By summer 2011, the project had spent the original £500 million from the government and the council was running out of money. The financial crisis meant the plans for vast new housing developments in Granton and Leith went up in smoke and so did the developer contributions that the council were very heavily counting upon. TIE were ordered to come up with affordable options:
a) Cancel the trams - this would cost a further £250m under the contract terms.
b) Stop the line at Haymarket - cost £240m
c) Stop the line at St Andrews Square - cost £260m. This had the least worst business case.
At the time the council was run by a Lib-Dem/SNP coalition. The SNP council group had always tried to pretend they opposed the project but they were part of the council implementing it! The Lib Dems went for Option C while the Tories voted B. The SNP abstained as they reasoned that Labour would do their dirty work for them by also supporting C. However Labour surprised everyone by going with the Tories. Suddenly phase 1a was to be reduced to Airport-Haymarket section only.
The Scottish Government throughout had maintained a position of "£500m and not a penny more". Now they were threatening to withhold £72 million if the tram didn't go to St Andrews Square. Crisis talks went on throughout summer 2011 and eventually the council had a second vote and backed option C (with no SNP abstention this time). Thus the SNP had come full circle and were now backing the project (albeit still on the "not a penny more terms"). To fund the extra £230 million required, the council borrowed the money. Once borrowing costs over 25 years were factored in, the cost of the project for half of phase 1a will total over £1 billion.
TIE will given the push with the council taking the project taking the project under direct control (hardly comforting given the Statutory Repairs scandal). While construction began to go fairly fast, a number of issues cropped up. The council insisted that the tram works on Princes Street had to be cleared by the beginning of December in time for the winter events (Christmas/Hogmanay etc). Work went on right up until the deadline, in pissing rain. Unsurprisingly there were soon reports of concrete cracking under the weight of buses. Eventually they were forced to go back up and dig the lot up again. Elsewhere there was a section on Shandwick Place that they relaid not once, not twice but THREE times before they got it right.
And what do we get for our money? We get a tram to the airport that is slower and more expensive than the excellent existing airport bus. Passengers at Waverley will have to walk further to get a tram than a bus and likewise at the airport. The environmental benefits are non-existent. There will be a very minimal reduction in the number of buses on the road as the tram uses a different route to the airport bus (which actually serves the hotels along the Western corridor) - so it is not even a "22 replacement" as some gentle critics claim!) As a result of the various traffic management plans thought up by TIE, traffic is being diverted away from the tram route and onto residential streets in the New Town, where several streets now routinely breach pollution limits - as predicted as long ago as 2003.
Traffic light sequences are a mess as priority is given to the trams - you can easily miss your go in a sequence and end up waiting 10 minutes. The trams are so long they block junctions. Two weeks ago they was a lightning strike that took down the city section of the line, leaving trams stranded. A tram broke down on Princes Street last week, right where the dual carriageway section narrows to one lane at the National Gallery (a restriction brought in to protect the gallery from rumbling of trams and buses going past at the same time!) causing gridlock in the city centre for two hours (in spite of the much vaulted plan to simply use the next tram to push a broken one).
The Council claim it will make a profit of £3 million - over 15 years. Except that figure is the combined figure for the new Transport for Edinburgh that lumps the trams in with the excellent Lothian Buses. If you take out the £55 million dividend that Lothian Buses is expected to pay over that period, it becomes very clear that the trams will never make a profit. That's before you consider that the council, not TramCo, is responsible for the costs of maintaining the infrastructure (30 year life). Add on the cost of the council's borrowing and you're looking at a loss of £25 million a year over the next 15 years. Despite all the talk about extending to Leith the truth is that the Council simply cannot afford to. Meanwhile our schools are literally crumbling.
ninja-lewis said:
dxg said:
If I recall, wasn't the tram project given the go ahead as a punishment for the city's populace rejecting congestion charging?
Correct.The tram and congestion charge were dreamed up by Transport Initiatives Edinburgh (TIE), which was the council's arm length body set up to "project manage" big transport projects.
The original idea was to build a loop in the north of the city, a line out to the Airport and Ratho and a third line down to the new Edinburgh Royal Infirmary (this one was to be funded by the congestion charge). One of the biggest proponents of a tram in the first place was the SNP's Kenny MacAskill (he of Lockerbie bomber fame). He was the one going around drumming up support for a tram project right up until the planned routes wouldn't serve his Edinburgh Eastern constituency. At that point he and the SNP became virulently hostile to the project.
About 10 years the plan was for a £435 million 3 phase project (a rearranged 2 line plan, not the earlier 3 line plan).
There was also a concurrent plan called EARL to tunnel under the airport to provide an rail link (to Edinburgh, Glasgow and the North).
In 2007 the SNP became the minority government at Holyrood. They planned to cancel the £500 million the Scottish Government was being asked to provide the project (the price having risen to £545). The other parties (Labour, Tory, Lib Dem and Greens) ganged up to force it through against the SNP. Committed to giving the money, the SNP threw their toys out of the pram, prohibiting Transport Scotland (the body that is supposed to oversee transport funding) from having any involvement in the project.
Thus in 2007 the Scottish Government was providing £500m and Edinburgh Council was committed to £45m. This would only be enough for phase 1a (the red section above). They were short about another £45m for Phase 1b so that was put on hold. The planned opening date was to be 2010.
Work started on the project. Steels were ordered for the full length of Phase 1a and 27 trams were ordered for the full three phase service. Rather than do the project incrementally, construction began at once across Phase 1a, including Leith.
Very quickly it was realised that the council's estimate of the utilities diversions required (so that they weren't under the planned tram lines) was out by a factor of two. Contractors quite rightly began asking for extra money (as it was TIE's fault). At one stage the most advanced section was Leith, which wasn't much use as the tram depot was at the other end of the line.
Things came to a head when TIE tried to overcome the utilities delays by getting Bilfinger Berger Siemens (the tram line contractor) to start their work before the utilities diversions were complete. BBS refused as their contract stated the utilities work was to be complete before they began. A rather sensible term considering that some of the utilities work had to be redone as it wasn't up to standard.
TIE began fighting every request for extra money from the contractors as the project increasing went over budget (hardly surprising given the utter balls up TIE had earlier made of the Stirling-Alloa rail line, which Network Rail is now having to substantially rebuild). Eventually work on the project stopped as TIE and the contractors became bogged down in arguments about whether TIE ought to pay changing the project spec. TIE tried to force things by going down the legal route in 2009. That rather backfired on them when the independent arbitrator sided with the contractors on 90% of the issues. Work eventually restarted in 2011.
Meanwhile construction of the 27 trams had proceeded without any issues to the point that the manufacturer wanted to begin deliveries but TIE had nowhere to put them (as the depot wasn't ready). Various ideas were explored including leasing them to other tram lines in the UK. Unfortunately the tram TIE had spec-ed had little in common with UK trams - being larger, longer and heavier. Eventually they just dumped them in a council depot, exposed to the elements.
By summer 2011, the project had spent the original £500 million from the government and the council was running out of money. The financial crisis meant the plans for vast new housing developments in Granton and Leith went up in smoke and so did the developer contributions that the council were very heavily counting upon. TIE were ordered to come up with affordable options:
a) Cancel the trams - this would cost a further £250m under the contract terms.
b) Stop the line at Haymarket - cost £240m
c) Stop the line at St Andrews Square - cost £260m. This had the least worst business case.
At the time the council was run by a Lib-Dem/SNP coalition. The SNP council group had always tried to pretend they opposed the project but they were part of the council implementing it! The Lib Dems went for Option C while the Tories voted B. The SNP abstained as they reasoned that Labour would do their dirty work for them by also supporting C. However Labour surprised everyone by going with the Tories. Suddenly phase 1a was to be reduced to Airport-Haymarket section only.
The Scottish Government throughout had maintained a position of "£500m and not a penny more". Now they were threatening to withhold £72 million if the tram didn't go to St Andrews Square. Crisis talks went on throughout summer 2011 and eventually the council had a second vote and backed option C (with no SNP abstention this time). Thus the SNP had come full circle and were now backing the project (albeit still on the "not a penny more terms"). To fund the extra £230 million required, the council borrowed the money. Once borrowing costs over 25 years were factored in, the cost of the project for half of phase 1a will total over £1 billion.
TIE will given the push with the council taking the project taking the project under direct control (hardly comforting given the Statutory Repairs scandal). While construction began to go fairly fast, a number of issues cropped up. The council insisted that the tram works on Princes Street had to be cleared by the beginning of December in time for the winter events (Christmas/Hogmanay etc). Work went on right up until the deadline, in pissing rain. Unsurprisingly there were soon reports of concrete cracking under the weight of buses. Eventually they were forced to go back up and dig the lot up again. Elsewhere there was a section on Shandwick Place that they relaid not once, not twice but THREE times before they got it right.
And what do we get for our money? We get a tram to the airport that is slower and more expensive than the excellent existing airport bus. Passengers at Waverley will have to walk further to get a tram than a bus and likewise at the airport. The environmental benefits are non-existent. There will be a very minimal reduction in the number of buses on the road as the tram uses a different route to the airport bus (which actually serves the hotels along the Western corridor) - so it is not even a "22 replacement" as some gentle critics claim!) As a result of the various traffic management plans thought up by TIE, traffic is being diverted away from the tram route and onto residential streets in the New Town, where several streets now routinely breach pollution limits - as predicted as long ago as 2003.
Traffic light sequences are a mess as priority is given to the trams - you can easily miss your go in a sequence and end up waiting 10 minutes. The trams are so long they block junctions. Two weeks ago they was a lightning strike that took down the city section of the line, leaving trams stranded. A tram broke down on Princes Street last week, right where the dual carriageway section narrows to one lane at the National Gallery (a restriction brought in to protect the gallery from rumbling of trams and buses going past at the same time!) causing gridlock in the city centre for two hours (in spite of the much vaulted plan to simply use the next tram to push a broken one).
The Council claim it will make a profit of £3 million - over 15 years. Except that figure is the combined figure for the new Transport for Edinburgh that lumps the trams in with the excellent Lothian Buses. If you take out the £55 million dividend that Lothian Buses is expected to pay over that period, it becomes very clear that the trams will never make a profit. That's before you consider that the council, not TramCo, is responsible for the costs of maintaining the infrastructure (30 year life). Add on the cost of the council's borrowing and you're looking at a loss of £25 million a year over the next 15 years. Despite all the talk about extending to Leith the truth is that the Council simply cannot afford to. Meanwhile our schools are literally crumbling.
Two-minute timelapse trip over the whole route here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-27610252
Looks so basic. The first few stations look like they're in the middle of fields. Staggering that they managed to spend so much money on it.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-27610252
Looks so basic. The first few stations look like they're in the middle of fields. Staggering that they managed to spend so much money on it.
kev1974 said:
Two-minute timelapse trip over the whole route here
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-27610252
Looks so basic. The first few stations look like they're in the middle of fields. Staggering that they managed to spend so much money on it.
From the Airport, the first stop is Ingliston Park and Ride - where the tram stop is right on the corner of the car park (whereas the buses used to depart from the middle). They planned to charge a premium £2.50 fare for using the tram by taking away £1.50 express P&R buses but have to back down and charge £1.50 in January. The short ride back to the airport will cost £4.50.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-27610252
Looks so basic. The first few stations look like they're in the middle of fields. Staggering that they managed to spend so much money on it.
The second stop is then Gogarburn for the RBS HQ on the other side of the A8 (crossed using the swanky bridge RBS have). There are supposedly plans to develop the area between Ingliston and Gogaburn into "Scotland's Global Hub" but that's a long way off, if it ever comes off.
The tram in the video halts at the depot, which isn't an actual stop as they haven't built the Edinburgh Gateway rail station yet just beyond
The next couple of stops are the Gyle shopping centre (again at the far end of the car park), Edinburgh Park Central(again, the stop is hardly in the area's centre of gravity) and Edinburgh Park station (for the rail line to Glasgow).
From there it follows the route of the old guided busway (itself built land that was set aside for long abandoned plans to bring the M8 into the centre of city). Bankhead, Saughton and Balgreen are hardly the most densely populated areas of the city, either residential or commerially. Matters are not helped by the rail line acting as a barrier to those on the north side of the line.
Murrayfield and Haymarket are about the only really convenient stops.
The Shandwick Place stop is farcically called "West End Princes Street". In reality it is in the middle of crescent about a 100m from the Shandwick Place shops and considerably further from Princes Street. There's then only the one stop on Princes Street between the Mound and Waverley Bridge (compared to buses that generally stop on most, if not all of the blocks).
St Andrew Square is supposed to serve Waverley station, the bus station and the East End. Picardy Place only really exists because the cross over they need to terminate the line is there.
The off road sections weren't so expensive other than the fact that they massively over specced everything (in some regards it is more like a proper railway than a tram). The cost is largely comes from the on-street sections: the utilities diversions, redoing sections and of course wasting tens of millions by starting work in Leith rather than in the West.
grumbledoak said:
As long as the Scots are paying for it themselves good luck to them.
As if. It's a massively overpriced bus replacement service at our expense. The only silver lining is that the embarrassment is Scotland's alone.
They hardly have a monopoly on expensive and useless grandiose projects though, do they?As if. It's a massively overpriced bus replacement service at our expense. The only silver lining is that the embarrassment is Scotland's alone.
I suspect it's a nationalist idea to show everyone that they're just as capable of wasting money in their own right and don't need our help.
AJS- said:
grumbledoak said:
As long as the Scots are paying for it themselves good luck to them.
As if. It's a massively overpriced bus replacement service at our expense. The only silver lining is that the embarrassment is Scotland's alone.
They hardly have a monopoly on expensive and useless grandiose projects though, do they?As if. It's a massively overpriced bus replacement service at our expense. The only silver lining is that the embarrassment is Scotland's alone.
I suspect it's a nationalist idea to show everyone that they're just as capable of wasting money in their own right and don't need our help.
k off".
TheSnitch said:
I fancy it even less with one of those fkers bearing down on me at traffic lights.
Part of the case for trams was because they are more intimidating than buses. They are literally intended to intimidate perfectly legal motorists (well, car drivers) off the roads. I've no idea how the pedestrians and the spandex brigade are expected to be immune - both are pretty squishy.kers bearing down on me at traffic lights. Gassing Station | News, Politics & Economics | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff