Tram Trains in Edinburgh

[Captain Bigwig]

Stop me if you've heard this before or you think it's crazy but I wanted to know if people on here thought there was any merit to this idea or not.

If you put a couple of crossovers between the northern two mainline rail tracks and the tram tracks immediately west of Haymarket station in Edinburgh (see picture below) you could use tram-trains similar to those being used in Sheffield to run through services between the Fife Circle and the end of the tram line in Leith (once they've finished building the extension there). This would give commuters on the Fife trains better access to parts of north Edinburgh further away from the rail network and free up much needed capacity at Edinburgh Waverley.

 

[waverley47]

Is that where people want to go thought? Waverley is a good spot for where people want to go, in terms of city centre locations its probably the better.

Second, paths. Not gonna work without wires across the bridge (a good five years away yet) and not enough capacity. If each team takes one path, that's the equivalent of a six coach emu shuttling back and forth. Could work, but probably a case of why bother in this location.

Not a bad idea overall though, there are a couple of lines in Edinburgh in which tram-trains are an interesting suggestion, but I think the Fife circle is probably a mismatch for this particular proposal.

 

[adamedwards]

An alternative would be a flyover from the tramlines to the Edinburgh Suburban Line at Murreyfield with team trains on that line and then on road branches further south. This assumes the speed on the rail lines is faster than a direct but congested route straight in to the city centre. Eventually the line could loop back to the team at Leith Walk. Or is this a solution looking for a problem?