Glasgow airport link

[Clansman]

I agree it is a better Bus but the Edinburgh one opens up more gateways than the Glasgow one

Nice pun

 

[Highland37]

Slightly off topic, but I wonder if the Deanside Branch, the rail line to car-dominated Braehead, could figure in these or alternative plans? A rail station there, terminus or a continuation, would be a great asset.

 

[XC90]

Slightly off topic, but I wonder if the Deanside Branch, the rail line to car-dominated Braehead, could figure in these or alternative plans? A rail station there, terminus or a continuation, would be a great asset.

I've often thought about that. The line goes right down to the road where the car parks are. All they would need to do is build a walkway from the terminus to the shopping centre. It would be accessible for places across Scotland too. Trains from the Inverclyde and Ayrshire would stop at cardonald, change ends, then down to Braehead. Even an hourly service from each would be acceptable. No room for a chord anymore from the west side.

It would need to be a terminus as there is no room for a rail line further on to Renfrew. I don't think a tram-train would work but if it did it would be the favourite option to connect Renfrew.

 

[clc]

Slightly off topic, but I wonder if the Deanside Branch, the rail line to car-dominated Braehead, could figure in these or alternative plans? A rail station there, terminus or a continuation, would be a great asset.

It certainly had the support of Derek Mackay a few years back:

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/news/13238125.Plan_to_deliver_railway_link_to_Renfrew/

However, Renfrewshire Council decided not to pursue a bid for a station at Braehead. My guess is it was a victim of Labour's obsession with the airport rail link - they knew it would undermine the case for the airport link as it would use up what little remaining spare capacity there was on the Paisley-Glasgow corridor.

Perhaps the council will get behind the idea of a station at Braehead when the tram train proposal finally hits the buffers, particularly if the SNP take control next May.

 

[sheeldz]

Also there is only a budget of £100m so nowhere near enough money to cover anything beyond a very short spur line.

This is ture. Additionally, if the rolling stock has to be BR standards of crash worthiness for mainline running how can they afford to buy all new bespoke stock in that budget too?

 

[Mordac]

This is ture. Additionally, if the rolling stock has to be BR standards of crash worthiness for mainline running how can they afford to buy all new bespoke stock in that budget too?

They might be able to tack on to the Sheffield 399 order to reduce costs a bit, but you're right that it still wouldn't come anywhere near that.

 

[Robinson]

Nobody has yet mentioned Glasgow Crossrail, which continually gets delayed but which would be a hell of a lot simpler than London Crossrail, and if this was done it would make GARL a lot more useful, no?

All it needs is electrification of the line through Gorbals, a few stations reopened and construction of a short chord to allow trains on this route to reach Queen St low level; no new tunnel boring through densely built-up land...

If a rail-Subway interchange could be built at West St this becomes an even better idea.

 

[NotATrainspott]

Nobody has yet mentioned Glasgow Crossrail, which continually gets delayed but which would be a hell of a lot simpler than London Crossrail, and if this was done it would make GARL a lot more useful, no?

All it needs is electrification of the line through Gorbals, a few stations reopened and construction of a short chord to allow trains on this route to reach Queen St low level; no new tunnel boring through densely built-up land...

If a rail-Subway interchange could be built at West St this becomes an even better idea.

It hasn't been mentioned because it's a totally rubbish idea that creates as many problems as it solves, all for money which would be better spent on almost anything else in the city. Infrastructure exists to serve a wider transport purpose, and the City Union Line simply can't serve any useful purpose in Glasgow. Through trains are a no-go, because they would miss out on all of the places where people actually want to go. The idea of turning trains westward into Queen Street LL looks tempting until you realise that it would then involve rebuilding High Street station underground to the west, and then having to deal with the capacity problems west of Charing Cross. While a turnback might solve some problems, it's quite arguable that the terminating paths it would make available would be better used for more services heading eastwards.

 

[kylemore]

Also there is only a budget of £100m so nowhere near enough money to cover anything beyond a very short spur line.

From what I understand what they are proposing is a tram link from the airport to Gilmour St where passengers would have to change to services to Glasgow Central.

Basically if you boarded a bus at the same time you could be in the City Centre while the tram passenger is still standing on the draughty Gilmour St platform waiting for a train. Daft.

Most passengers would still use the express bus (mirroring the embarrassing situation at Edinburgh Airport) unless you could persuade the Airport Authority to ban them from the premises!

And anyway £100m seems a bit of an underestimate for even that - in other words a World Class Fiasco (up to Edinburgh Tram standards) in the making!

 

[NotATrainspott]

From what I understand what they are proposing is a tram link from the airport to Gilmour St where passengers would have to change to services to Glasgow Central.

Basically if you boarded a bus at the same time you could be in the City Centre while the tram passenger is still standing on the draughty Gilmour St platform waiting for a train. Daft.

Most passengers would still use the express bus (mirroring the embarrassing situation at Edinburgh Airport) unless you could persuade the Airport Authority to ban them from the premises!

And anyway £100m seems a bit of an underestimate for even that - in other words a World Class Fiasco (up to Edinburgh Tram standards) in the making!

No, they're proposing that the tram-trains will run all the way to Glasgow Central. Basically, the reason for tram-trains is that they make it far cheaper to build the spur from the heavy rail line to the Airport. Otherwise, the scheme is pretty much the same as the original GARL, including all of its flaws.

 

[XC90]

Nobody has yet mentioned Glasgow Crossrail, which continually gets delayed but which would be a hell of a lot simpler than London Crossrail, and if this was done it would make GARL a lot more useful, no?

All it needs is electrification of the line through Gorbals, a few stations reopened and construction of a short chord to allow trains on this route to reach Queen St low level; no new tunnel boring through densely built-up land...

If a rail-Subway interchange could be built at West St this becomes an even better idea.

Although I never said 'crossrail', access to an airport link for services from the north i.e Inverness Aberdeen etc would depend on crossrail. A station at the saltmarket (end of Howard st) is fine for people wishing to get off in the city centre.

The budget for this tram link is £144m not £100m.

 

[John R]

Agreed. Though it is worth reading the surface access report from AECOM that compares the options:
http://www.glasgowairport.com/media/37884/ga-exec-summary_final.pdf

This highlights the need to assess capacity on the existing rail network which has not yet been done:


This does include the option of running as a shuttle service from Paisley Gilmour Street should capacity not be available. Given that no work has been done to cost the infrastructure required on Paisley - Glasgow corridor and at Glasgow Central it is reasonable to suggest that a tram shuttle service is still a possibility until the cost of the capacity is taken into account.

I'm a bit puzzled, as the only bit of the GARL project that was actually done was to increase capacity between Paisley and Glasgow. Has that capacity subsequently been completely used up by other service enhancements?

 

[XC90]

I'm a bit puzzled, as the only bit of the GARL project that was actually done was to increase capacity between Paisley and Glasgow. Has that capacity subsequently been completely used up by other service enhancements?

It has. There are now 3 lines between shields and arkleston and 4 between arkleston and paisley. Capacity has increased to 4tph between Glasgow and Ayr. The extra Ayr services are express between glasgow and Kilwinning, both ways.

 

[Mag_seven]

As I've stated hundreds of times before the bus is perfectly adequate. It runs through the city centre depositing passengers at hotels, shopping areas, Central and Queen St stations.

 

[HH]

As I've stated hundreds of times before the bus is perfectly adequate. It runs through the city centre depositing passengers at hotels, shopping areas, Central and Queen St stations.

It's perfectly adequate, if you want to go to the centre of Glasgow, most of the time. A direct rail link would be faster though, at least during peaks.

 

[kylemore]

No, they're proposing that the tram-trains will run all the way to Glasgow Central. Basically, the reason for tram-trains is that they make it far cheaper to build the spur from the heavy rail line to the Airport. Otherwise, the scheme is pretty much the same as the original GARL, including all of its flaws.

That's even worse £100m won't even begin to look at that!

 

[Altnabreac]

I'm a bit puzzled, as the only bit of the GARL project that was actually done was to increase capacity between Paisley and Glasgow. Has that capacity subsequently been completely used up by other service enhancements?

It has. There are now 3 lines between shields and arkleston and 4 between arkleston and paisley. Capacity has increased to 4tph between Glasgow and Ayr. The extra Ayr services are express between glasgow and Kilwinning, both ways.

Mainly. The GARL project created capacity for an extra 4tph Paisley - Glasgow. Subsequently the Ayr service has been increased by 2tph and the Inverclyde service by 1tph. So in theory there is still an extra 1tph unused. The whole reason that work wasn't cancelled with GARL was that the capacity could be used to relive Ayrshire services.

There are also peak extras running so the tram business case assumes those peak only paths can be used by trams in non peak hours. The wiseness of using peak only paths all day and the impact of doing so on reliability and PPM (a big topic for Scotrail these days) is not discussed.

So far the position of Glasgow and Renfrewshire Council has been that capacity increases on the mainline and at Glasgow Central are issues for Network Rail and Transport Scotland to resolve and fund outwith the city deal money.

What is likely to happen is to get Network Rail to cost up this work (as extra services for Inverclyde and Ayrshire area proposed in the Scotland Route Study anyway so useful to know costs for that) and then the revised business case will take into account the extra costs. Assuming that the cost then doubles from £150m to £300m the BCR will then fall from around 2 to below 1 and the whole thing will be kicked out.

My guess at that point is that PRT makes a comeback. But before then we will have 2 years of arguing while Labour and SNP try to blame each other for it not happening.

 

[XC90]

My guess at that point is that PRT makes a comeback. But before then we will have 2 years of arguing while Labour and SNP try to blame each other for it not happening.[/QUOTE]

I would be amazed if the SNP blamed anyone else for GARL not happening but I wouldn't put it past them.

 

[Altnabreac]

My guess at that point is that PRT makes a comeback. But before then we will have 2 years of arguing while Labour and SNP try to blame each other for it not happening.

I would be amazed if the SNP blamed anyone else for GARL not happening but I wouldn't put it past them.

They will be blaming each other for "GARL2 - The revenge of the Tram". Think the blame for GARL 1 has settled now although the design around the fuel farm in particular was disputed and you can make a case that the poor design of the initial plans contributed to it's eventual cancellation.

 

[NotATrainspott]

One of the other issues with the original GARL proposal was that the platforms were only going to be 4x23m long. That's fine for a dedicated shuttle service but it would make it pretty difficult to integrate it into any other electrified services, either with a reversal at Central or with a future cross-city link. Such extended services would have been one of the few things that could have made the branch significantly busier, as access to the airport from the east of the city currently isn't very good.

 

[clc]

One of the other issues with the original GARL proposal was that the platforms were only going to be 4x23m long. That's fine for a dedicated shuttle service but it would make it pretty difficult to integrate it into any other electrified services, either with a reversal at Central or with a future cross-city link. Such extended services would have been one of the few things that could have made the branch significantly busier, as access to the airport from the east of the city currently isn't very good.

If the cross city tunnel was built perhaps a cheaper heavy rail version of GARL could be built (call it GARL 3). We know that an airport-Central shuttle would have to stop at PGS in order to have any semblance of a business case. We also know that route requires a very expensive viaduct approaching the terminal from the west and relocation of the fuel farm. However, if you could run direct services from the airport terminal to Edinburgh, Cumbernauld, Stirling and even Dundee without bypassing Glasgow City Centre, then, as you say, the airport branch line for GARL 3 would carry more passengers than versions 1 and 2, possibly removing the need to stop at PGS. If a stop at PGS was no longer essential then the branch line could approach the terminal from the east. TS has confirmed that a viable route exists from Arkleston right up to the south east corner of Terminal 2 utilising the solum of the old Renfrew Branch. Trains would run non stop from the Airport to the City Centre in around 13 minutes.

The only downside of GARL 3 I can think of is there would be no interchange for Ayrshire/Inverclyde services, but I don't think this would be a deal breaker as only 10% of airport users are to/from locations accessed by the routes through Gilmour Street.

 

[XC90]

If the cross city tunnel was built perhaps a cheaper heavy rail version of GARL could be built (call it GARL 3). We know that an airport-Central shuttle would have to stop at PGS in order to have any semblance of a business case. We also know that route requires a very expensive viaduct approaching the terminal from the west and relocation of the fuel farm. However, if you could run direct services from the airport terminal to Edinburgh, Cumbernauld, Stirling and even Dundee without bypassing Glasgow City Centre, then, as you say, the airport branch line for GARL 3 would carry more passengers than versions 1 and 2, possibly removing the need to stop at PGS. If a stop at PGS was no longer essential then the branch line could approach the terminal from the east. TS has confirmed that a viable route exists from Arkleston right up to the south east corner of Terminal 2 utilising the solum of the old Renfrew Branch. Trains would run non stop from the Airport to the City Centre in around 13 minutes.



The only downside of GARL 3 I can think of is there would be no interchange for Ayrshire/Inverclyde services, but I don't think this would be a deal breaker as only 10% of airport users are to/from locations accessed by the routes through Gilmour Street.

The Route via arkleston is the best route in my opinion. The old station next to the college on Renfrew rd, could reopen as a Paisley stop (if required). A bus would still run from PYG to the airport as a connection. Once the new road bridge is built at the Renfrew ferry a bus from Clydebank - Renfrew - Airport - Paisley will connect north and south Clyde rail users. This should run via the Normandy hotel and down the back of the airport to avoid most of the congestion. Also a shorter route.

Sorted, lets get on with it now!

 

[DynamicSpirit]

I remain to be convinced that Paisley is the way to go with the rail link to Glasgow Airport. 4tph on the Glasgow-Paisley stretch (in addition to four trains an hour in Central) is a significant drain on capacity that I would argue could be better used on Ayrshire and Inverclyde services. I think the services will be lightly loaded by comparison to the busy trains running down that route to other destinations.

Couldn't that particularly problem be solved by making the airport tram-trains the stopping trains between Paisley and Glasgow? That way more of the passengers use the airport tram-trains, the intermediate stations between Paisley and Glasgow get a more frequent service, and the line to Gourock gets a (slightly) faster service to Glasgow. I realize that still leaves the problem of capacity needing to be increased east of Paisley.

 

[me123]

Not perfectly.

1) Glasgow-Paisley isn't four tracked (only three for the most part). A 15 minute stopping service in both directions wouldn't allow overtaking in both directions, so capacity is limited. That is in no small part why the stations have a relatively poor 2tph given their proximity to Glasgow and large number of services running past.
2) I would be surprised if the Glasgow Airport services weren't expresses. This was the plan with the original GARL and I'd expect it to be revived this time around too. It will undoubtedly be billed as a premium route with a premium price tag to match, so stopping in Cardonald is not to be advised. It will also want to compete with the buses on time, so the few minutes spent stopping at the local halts would not be acceptable.

 

[clc]

Scotland's Transport Secretary Humza Yousaf said he would be working with Renfrewshire and Glasgow City Councils and the airport on the plans.



That's the important bit in here. The current draft business case for tram train does not identify any spare capacity on the Paisley - Glasgow rail corridor, any spare capacity for Tram Trains at Glasgow Central station or any alternatives such as street running in Glasgow. The BCR for tram train does not include any costs for providing capacity on Paisley corridor, Glasgow Central or Glasgow street running and is based purely on the cost of providing the new track from Paisley to the airport and hoping capacity elsewhere appears magically from thin air.

Once a full business case looks at these costs the BCR will plummet and the PRT solution will be adopted instead. In the short term however it is a political football with the council elections coming up in May 2017 so no one is willing to point out the current BCR is utterly fictional.

They could fudge it. This report states that a rail timetable study has identified a potential service level involving four tram trains per hour in the off peak and two or three in the AM and PM peaks. Timetable compliant train paths and platforms are available without having to build new capacity. BCR ranges between 2.5:1 and 3.2:1. Supposedly it would be an 'interim' service level:

https://www.glasgow.gov.uk/councillorsandcommittees/viewSelectedDocument.asp?c=P62AFQDNDN0GT1Z381

 

[6Z09]

Given the cost, the whole idea is a waste of money as the bus links at present are adequate, and with a fraction of the cost could surely be improved rather than another "vanity project".

 

[route:oxford]

Given the cost, the whole idea is a waste of money as the bus links at present are adequate, and with a fraction of the cost could surely be improved rather than another "vanity project".

This is one of the reasons why public infrastructure in the UK is in such a terrible state.

"Adequate" is only fractionally off the bottom of the scale. "Adequate" is what the bus services were that replaced rail services in the Beeching cuts.

"Adequate" is simply not good enough.

It cannot be vain to aspire to having high quality rail transit to an international airport.

I don't use Glasgow Airport because it is quite simply awful to get to from Stirling.

How hard can it be to have a rail link between Clydebank and Paisley with an Airport station inbetween?

Then, with a new flying junction at Ashfield/Springburn and the re-opening of a low-level platform at Queen Street, you could have a dedicated "Airport" platform at Queen Street with services operating on wide one-way loop to limit conflicting movements at that end.

It's effectively Cross-rail.

 

[Altnabreac]

They could fudge it. This report states that a rail timetable study has identified a potential service level involving four tram trains per hour in the off peak and two or three in the AM and PM peaks. Timetable compliant train paths and platforms are available without having to build new capacity. BCR ranges between 2.5:1 and 3.2:1. Supposedly it would be an 'interim' service level:

https://www.glasgow.gov.uk/councillorsandcommittees/viewSelectedDocument.asp?c=P62AFQDNDN0GT1Z381

Still nothing in there that convinces me it will happen. States timetable compliant paths found for some services but nothing about Central platform capacity.

Also what a consultant claims is a compliant path and what Network Rail / TOCs are willing to have as actual working train paths are not the same in my experience.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

This is one of the reasons why public infrastructure in the UK is in such a terrible state.

"Adequate" is only fractionally off the bottom of the scale. "Adequate" is what the bus services were that replaced rail services in the Beeching cuts.

"Adequate" is simply not good enough.

It cannot be vain to aspire to having high quality rail transit to an international airport.

I don't use Glasgow Airport because it is quite simply awful to get to from Stirling.

How hard can it be to have a rail link between Clydebank and Paisley with an Airport station inbetween?

Then, with a new flying junction at Ashfield/Springburn and the re-opening of a low-level platform at Queen Street, you could have a dedicated "Airport" platform at Queen Street with services operating on wide one-way loop to limit conflicting movements at that end.

It's effectively Cross-rail.

Well you won't get that for £144m. And there isn't any other money so it wouldn't happen even if that were a sensible plan (which it isn't).

If you are tunnelling under the Clyde it will be to link Shields Road to Springburn with an Underground station at Central not some tour of Glasgow's western suburbs.

 

[takno]

...
I don't use Glasgow Airport because it is quite simply awful to get to from Stirling.

How hard can it be to have a rail link between Clydebank and Paisley with an Airport station inbetween?

Well it's not going to be cheap. Stirling would be better off if they spent the money doing the Dalmeny chord so you can get into Edinburgh Gateway.

 

[Altnabreac]

Well it's not going to be cheap. Stirling would be better off if they spent the money doing the Dalmeny chord so you can get into Edinburgh Gateway.

Yes indeed. Dalmeny Chord will happen in CP6 I'm sure.

Initially Stirling services are likely to remain going via the new station in Winchburgh and Edinburgh Park and I'm not sure Gateway is a huge time saving compared to Edinburgh Park.

However once the proposed new Glasgow - Cumbernauld - Falkirk Grahamston - Edinburgh service starts I'd perhaps expect it to pick up the Winchburgh / Edinburgh Park calls and Stirling services to run limited stop via Edinburgh Gateway.