That is Polly BS for “we building more roads but need to claim a public transport improvement to look good”. Buses stuck in congestion are not reliable!
I only beaten by claiming “bus stop indents to remove bus from general traffic lane are public transport improvements”
Buses aren’t ideal at all, but it’s what can be put on now. A train is at least 20-30 years away it seems. It’s likely to come after Sunshine Coast line.
Another approach that might work in this situation is incremental delivery.
You could imagine up to three stations built at Acacia Ridge, Parkinson (Nottingham Road) and Browns Plains, and then running your feeder buses off that.
However, this would require a firm decision on alignment - via the current corridor or via the mains rd corridor.
The benefit of the incremental approach is that stations at Acacia Ridge, Parkinson and Browns Plains can be justified now.
Stations at Greenbank and Flagstone can be justified now. I know people from those areas who commute to work in the city by driving to Springfield to park n ride. It’s crazy
You’re right, but this isn’t Perth. The Queensland Government moves rail projects along at a glacial pace, it’s very much slower than say WA or NSW.
I know there are other issues to address before this line is possible, but had a thought.
I know there is next to no political will for this line to be constructed, so I was trying to think about a solution that might potentially generate some political will.
What about a line constructed down the interstate line with a spur to Browns Plains. Stations would be located at Acacia Ridge and Algester. At Browns Plains there would be a bus interchange with BRT connections to Greenbank, Flagstone, Loganlea and Springfield Central. I’d also advocate for BRT from here down the Mains Road corridor to Garden City so people can change at Altandi for Gold Coast services and Upper Mount Gravatt for ‘metro’ and other bus routes.
This could be a lower cost solution instead of constructing the line all the way to Beaudesert. It would also provide a well connected region, allow more potential for development at Browns Plains and also remove bus routes that go all the way to the CBD which would free up resources for cross town or other services, and help address congestion on the South East Busway.
I know it’s not perfect, but I do think it could be an option.
I bet the connection from the Beaudesert line to Browns Plains would be better as a bus connection (preferably a dedicated busway). The busway would then extend across SR94 Browns Plains Rd, and will then connect with Loganlea station, providing a good orbital bus route linking the Beenleigh/GC and Beaudesert lines. The busway would also link up with the 140BUZ as well.
If the connection was built as a rail line, then the rail line would have to be tunnelled, as the area between Loganlea and Browns Plains is packed with housing. The two portals would be at the forested area north of Hillcrest and the the fields between Loganlea and Bethania.
Honestly, I don’t think anything like that will happen. Best you’ll get is a station located at Johnson Road in Hillcrest with a new bus interchange built with buses that currently are terminating at Browns Plains extended to that new station. Bus lanes might be a more appropriate form of infrastructure along Browns Plains Road and Kingston Road.
In the meantime though, given that line is Federally owned, I’m not sure how the State will go about getting permission to use it for state services. My guess is that they will add additional tracks alongside that federally owned track.
It’s standard gauge only past Acacia Ridge anyway, so infrastructure works would be required irrespective of if you dual-gauged the line or built one adjacent to it.
Original state gov plans called for 4 tracks in the corridor:
Some time ago, there was a third rail added to the standard gauge line for 1067mm (3’ 6”) gauge, but it was not really finished off and has never been used. I think it goes to Bromelton then finishes off.
Greenbank crossing loop, showing the dual gauge.
According to openrailwaymap.org the dual gauge goes as far as Bromelton, and Satellite view on google maps looks like dual gauge south of Acacia Ridge, but the QR track diagrams at https://www.queenslandrail.com.au/business/acccess/Documents/Brisbane%20Metropolitan%20System%20Information%20Pack%20-%20Issue%203%20-%20October%202016.pdf show standard gauge only from Acacia Ridge. Not sure what to make of it.
Correct, my presumption was based on the QR suburban network package.
Maybe it was never commissioned officially because there are no facilities present to make use of it.
Article is not paywalled. It is from 2014.
Bromelton State Development area
There has been some development at Bromelton but apparently no intent to use the dual gauge at this time.
For anyone interested I was able to find a RBoT archived thread on Acacia Ridge to Bromelton Upgrade 2010
This has photographs.
I know SCT and Gemco, both are easily seen from the roadside on the Beaudesert-Boonah Rd. I think access is currently only from the south only and no north connection was built.
I believe there is a gap in Acacia Ridge yard on the narrow gauge. If that was joined, it would be fairly easy to run trains assuming infrastructure such as signal circuits are already in place.
I doubt if any signalling for the dual gauge has been done. In 2010 the third rail was not properly secured, only positioned with clips on about one sleeper in 30 or so. The dual gauge points on loops were not in place. Don’t think anything has been done since then, so it would probably be a lot of work to get it up to speed. Be interesting to see some more recent photographs.
2010, the third rail is not properly secured.
The dual gauge rail was really only placed down. It cannot and has never been able to run any narrow gauge train on it. They would have to do it all again from the start if anyone wanted to run a NG train south of acacia ridge.
It seems very strange to build infrastructure that can’t be used.
