It’s taken me longer than I thought to get this post to something approximating shipshape. I’m not sure it’s perfect yet. Reminder: the views expressed on my personal blog do not necessarily represent the views of the PTUA.

Following on from previous posts about the Loop, the next question is: Should the City Loop reverse directions at lunchtime?

The Loop was built to solve the problems of pedestrian crowding at Flinders Street, and to avoid having trains reverse at busy platforms in the City. They can’t all run as cross-city services, as there has traditionally been an imbalance in the number of suburbs, and trains, between the east and west.

The Loop was built to be bi-directional. At some stage during the design process, someone decided that Loop trains should stop at the underground stations first in the morning on the way into the City, and last in the afternoon on the way out.

On each of the four loop lines signalling will be designed for trains to run in one direction in the morning peak and for most of the day. The direction of running will be reversed for the evening peak.

— Victorian Railways Newsletter, June 1970

In the context of the original infrastructure and operating plan — with for instance trains from the east in the morning running around the Loop then into massive stabling areas just east of Flinders Street, and back the other way in the afternoon — this made sense.

But this doesn’t generally happen anymore — most of the stabling is now in the suburbs (though there is still some around North Melbourne), so it largely doesn’t matter which direction each Loop tunnel runs.

The problems of reversal

For passengers, it’s confusing. Unlike, say, Heathrow Airport’s loop (at least before the Terminal 5 stub opened), and others around the world, it’s difficult to represent on a map. Instead you need a whole series of maps. (Note the maps linked-to are not up to date, if you were hoping to use them.)

It’s limiting. You can’t get from the underground stations to Flinders Street and Southern Cross after 1pm on weekdays, for instance.

It results in long gaps between trains during the changeover. In the Burnley tunnel the last train inbound via Parliament is at 12:45pm. The next one (outbound) isn’t until 1:13pm. This limits the Loop’s usefulness just at the time when many are packing onto trams for intra-CBD travel at lunchtime.

It’s unfair to peak hour commuters going to particular stations, for instance Sydenham line to Southern Cross people, who either change trains or have a long trip right around the Loop, in both morning and evening peak.

The benefits of reversal

Running whole lines via the Loop means you are likely to have large numbers of people getting off trains at North Melbourne and Richmond and wanting to get into the Loop in morning peak, and out again in the afternoon. Without the reversal, you may not serve them very well… they may have to instead change at Southern Cross or Flinders Street, making for a longer trip.

With the reversal, peak hour commuters can follow the same route home as they took in, so for some people it is easier to remember.

The Clifton Hill example

In 2008 the Clifton Hill loop began running clockwise all day on weekdays. This was to avoid a bottleneck near Jolimont. It meant for the first time that it was possible to get from Flinders Street and Southern Cross to the underground stations in the morning.

It’s not perfect. There are often delays at Flinders Street before the train proceeds around the Loop. In some cases trains go out of service at Flinders Street — because a minor fault (one that can wait until the end of a run) has been found, and the run ends at Flinders Street. These problems could probably be resolved with changes to work practices.

Even if the train runs as timetabled, Jolimont to Parliament (via Flinders Street) now takes up to 14 minutes in peak (including sitting at Flinders Street for 2 minutes), against around 3 minutes direct.

Oddly at weekends, the Clifton Hill loop reverses, running anti-clockwise. Apparently this is to ensure the drivers remain qualified to run trains that way, and it ensure the outbound track from Flinders Street to Jolimont remains in use (it can become problematic otherwise). Are these good enough reasons to reverse the pattern and confuse everybody? I’m not convinced.

A possible scenario

Let’s say two tunnels ran clockwise, two anti-clockwise, and some lines ran via the Loop, some direct.

For instance…

Sandringham, Frankston, Williamstown, Werribee, Glen Waverley all direct. (For now, Frankstons run half direct and half via the Loop. I think it would actually be unwise to run all Frankstons direct at this stage, because of how busy the line is. The same goes for any of the longer lines. You’d have too many people needing to change to Loop trains.)

Hurstbridge and Epping: run clockwise around the Loop. It should be clockwise to avoid the bottleneck junction at Jolimont. They should all run via the Loop because they share tracks from Clifton Hill inwards anyway.

Craigieburn, Upfield and Sydenham: let’s suppose these run anti-clockwise. While running them clockwise would be good to avoid a minor clash with Seymour trains, it would also overload them at North Melbourne with Williamstown/Werribee people wanting the Loop.

Now how about if we run Cranbourne/Pakenham clockwise around the Loop.

To balance it out, Belgrave/Lilydale/Ringwood/Blackburn trains would run anti-clockwise.

To make it work properly, there would need to be no delays at Flinders Street. Stop, passengers off, passengers on, leave straight away. It needs to be just another station along the line. Done properly, this would involve moving driver shift-changes to somewhere else; probably at the ends of lines.

How would that work for passengers? I’ve tried to work it all out in a table. Skip this bit if this kind of detail is likely to put you to sleep.

Line	Service	for Flinders St (FSS)	for Southern Cross (SXS)	Flagstaff (FGS)	Melb Central (MCE)	Parliament (PAR)
Sandringham	Direct to FSS	Stay on train	Change at FSS	Change at RMD to Burnley Loop	Change at RMD to Burnley Loop	Change at RMD to Burnley Loop
Frankston	Direct to FSS and SXS (then to Newport)	Stay on train	Stay on train	Change at SXS to Caulfield or or Clifton Hill Loop train	Change at RMD to Burnley Loop	Change at RMD to Burnley Loop
Caulfield Loop (Cranbourne/ Pakenham)	to FSS then clockwise around Loop	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train, or change at RMD to Burnley Loop*	Stay on train, or change at RMD to Burnley Loop*
Glen Waverley	Direct to FSS	Stay on train	Change at FSS to Caulfield Loop, or Newport train	Change at FSS to Caulfield or Clifton Hill Loop, or change at RMD to Burnley Loop	Change at RMD to Burnley Loop	Change at RMD to Burnley Loop
Burnley Loop (Belgrave/ Lilydale / Alamein)	to Loop anticlockwise, then FSS	Stay on train, or change at RMD to Glen Waverley, Sandringham or Frankston train*	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train
Clifton Hill (Hurstbridge/ Epping)	to FSS then clockwise around Loop	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train, or change at FSS to Northern Loop*
Northern Loop (Upfield/ Craigieburn / Sydenham)	to SXS, FSS then anti-clockwise around Loop	Stay on train	Stay on train	Stay on train, or change at SXS to Caulfield Loop*	Stay on train, or change at SXS to Caulfield Loop*	Stay on train
Newport (Werribee/ Williamstown)	Direct to SXS, then FSS	Stay on train	Stay on train	Change at SXS to Caulfield Loop	Change at SXS to Caulfield Loop	Change at SXS to Caulfield Loop or FSS to Northern Loop

Note: Approximate current CBD usage is: Flinders Street 37%, Melbourne Central 22%, Parliament 17%, Southern Cross 16%, Flagstaff 8%.

*The asterisks highlight the optional changes that people might make if they were in a hurry. The issue is that if too many of them change, it’s likely to create crowding at interchange stations, and on other trains.

Would they bother? I don’t know. It might not be worth the bother for most people. For someone arriving on a clockwise Loop train going to Parliament, if changing trains involves a wait of 0-4 minutes for a connection, to save perhaps 7 minutes, they might just stay on the train.

So what should happen?

I’m not sure.

In an ideal world, I think you would go for each loop tunnel running in a consistent direction. Have some clockwise, some anti-clockwise, and ensure that you could get from any CBD station to any other, at any time of day, preferably with a combination that allows a backup if one loop tunnel is disrupted. It’s got a lot of benefits. And you’d ensure trains travelled straight through Flinders Street with the quickest stop possible.

But it’s not an ideal world. The prospect of some lines running direct (the majority, at least on this blog, seem to support it, and it’s starting to happen anyway), means that large numbers of passengers may want to change trains and travel between Richmond and Parliament/Melbourne Central, as well as North Melbourne and Flagstaff (eg trips which are considerably longer by going the long way around).

Because the Burnley and Caulfield Loops both go through Richmond, if they ran in different directions, I suspect you’d be almost bound to get lots and lots of people in the morning changing onto whichever one went anticlockwise to Parliament.

It would be fascinating to see some detailed analysis on it.

What do you think?

Voting results:

• It’s better that it changes direction at lunchtime on weekdays. Leave it alone! — 6 (9%)
• It should change direction at lunchtime on weekends as well! — 1 (1%)
• Each Loop tunnel should run in a one direction all day. One way on weekdays, the opposite way on weekends. — 8 (12%)
• Each Loop tunnel should run in a one direction all day; the same way every day of the week. — 43 (63%)
• Ooh. Tricky. I’m really not sure. — 10 (15%)

Reminder: the views expressed on my personal blog do not necessarily represent the views of the PTUA.

So, the result of the poll a few days ago was:

Run some lines via the Loop, some direct to Flinders St: 129 (66.8%)
Run each line half via the Loop, half direct to Flinders St: 57 (29.5%)
Squeeze everything into the Loop: 7 (3.6%)

Just under 30% wanted about half the trains on each line to run direct, half through the Loop. This is how the Loop was originally run, theoretically giving people a choice, although in practice the longer-distance expresses (for example Belgrave and Lilydale) tended to be Loop services, and the shorter-distance trains (Blackburn, Alamein) tended to be Direct, which limited the choice for most people… in effect, in fact, being closer to the other option. (Source: Electric Traction, February 1981.)

I don’t know how the general public would react if asked the question about how the Loop should run. (Maybe someone should.) But I suspect increasingly people are aware of how “metro” rail systems overseas run: primarily point-to-point, minimising merges, junctions and all that messy stuff to pack as many trains along the track as possible, and accepting that some people will have to change to get where they’re going, or walk a little further to their destination.

So could you do it?

My personal view is in line with the majority here: they should be moving towards some lines running via the Loop, some lines direct. Having consistent patterns means it is predictable to passengers, and you can fit more trains onto the tracks without causing hiccups as they merge into the Loop tunnels.

As long as trains are frequent enough, and the interchange facilities are good enough — including signage (both static and electronic) — it’s not an insurmountable issue to change trains, if the payback is there with more reliable, more frequent, less crowded trains. Melbourne needs to do a lot better in these aspects, of course.

There are limits to what you can do in the real world. One would be rightly cautious for instance about shifting all peak-hour Frankston trains out of the Loop. (At present in peak, the stopping trains run via the Loop, the expresses run direct to Flinders Street.) The sheer demand from people trying to pack onto the remaining Loop trains at Richmond means it’s not something that can be done without causing much bigger problems.

(A similar poll on a PTUA member email list — which does not contain all members, only those who wish to participate in discussions — was more strongly in favour of the first option, with 96% for consistency, 4% wanting lines half into the Loop, half out. Nobody wanted to squeeze every possible train into the Loop. The PTUA doesn’t have a detailed policy on this yet; the poll was to help guide that.)

Stand by for another post, specifically about Loop direction.