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North-South Rail Freight Growth - Opportunities & Impediments. Presentation to BTRE Transport Colloquium – June 2007. Background. ARTC’s North-South Strategy was publicly announced in May 2005. Two key principles underpin the strategy: ARTC is committed to growing rail volumes.
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North-South Rail Freight Growth -Opportunities & Impediments • Presentation to BTRE Transport Colloquium – June 2007
Background • ARTC’s North-South Strategy was publicly announced in May 2005. • Two key principles underpin the strategy: • ARTC is committed to growing rail volumes. • The strategy must be driven by the market. • This presentation will: • Outline the underlying economics behind the strategy. • Describe how this translates into specific projects. • Discuss the expected outcomes from the investment. • Provide an update on progress with delivery. • Briefly discuss where to next.
Interdependency • The strategy revolves around five concepts – Price, Availability, Reliability, Capacity and Transit time. • These concepts are highly interdependent. • That is, any concept that relates to one usually relates to all. • Developing the strategy is therefore not a simple matter of following the branches of a logic tree. • Also leads the strategy to be hugely synergistic.
Capacity & Transit Time • Capacity and transit time seem like distinct concepts but are almost circular. • Capacity is a function of practical headways. Anything that reduces headways will (all other things being equal) increase capacity. • A key consequence of reducing transit times is that it generally reduces headway. • Hence, transit time projects increase capacity. • Transit time is the combination of raw (unconstrained) transit time and delay from interference by other trains. • Projects to increase capacity will reduce the impact of interference for a given number of trains. • Hence capacity projects reduce transit time.
Transit Time & Reliability • Transit time also has a close interrelationship with reliability. • Operators can trade-off transit time to increase reliability and vice versa. • The extent to which operators do this will be a matter for them. • However, it is assumed that operators will be aiming to achieve a step change from the current very poor reliability levels. • The interrelationship between capacity, reliability and transit time also makes it convenient to express most project benefits in terms off their transit time impact at a given train volume.
Market Outcomes • South projects will reduce transit time from approximately 13.5 hours to 10.7 at current average freight density. If operators chose to go to longer trains, transit time is estimated at 11.4 hours. • This transit time reduction is achieved while increasing train numbers from approximately 4 each way per day to 10. • North Coast projects will reduce transit time from approximately 19.4 hours to 15.5. • Achieved while increasing train numbers from approximately 4 each way per day to 9. • Operators can also trade-off transit time for reliability.
Project Delivery • Alliance partners in place. • Concrete sleeper tenders awarded. • 3 North Coast loops under construction (Braunstone, Namoona, Tamrookum). • Construction commenced on 4 passing lanes (Gerogery – Table Top, Henty – Culcairn, The Rock – Yerong Creek, Wagga - Uranquinty). • Concrete sleepering advancing as fast as sleepers are being delivered – New Bomen sleeper plant output available shortly. • TCC related signalling works complete in September. • SSFL Environmental Approval granted – tendering to commence shortly. • Tottenham – Dynon / Tottenham triangle underway. • Wagga bridge completed. Leeville viaduct 60% complete.
Further rail investment: Should be directed at achieving the largest possible reduction in road GTK for the available funding. Should be grounded in an understanding of the factors that drive market share. By 2015 the Melbourne – Brisbane market will only represent 13% of the combined road GTK for the three intercapital general freight markets. Future investment should benefit Melbourne – Sydney and Sydney – Brisbane as well as Melbourne – Brisbane. Investment in Rail Beyond 2009
Investment in Rail Beyond 2009 (cont’d) • Biggest issue is Northern Sydney. • NSRCS identified reliability through Sydney as the biggest constraint on performance. • Southern Sydney Freight Line will address the issues in the south. • Further investment in Northern Sydney could significantly improve Sydney – Brisbane performance, as well as solve the key constraint on Melbourne – Brisbane competitiveness. • ARTC would like to see 4 freight paths per hour for most of the day. • Terminals are also important for the Melbourne – Sydney and Sydney – Brisbane markets. • ARTC remains strongly supportive of the Moorebank proposal. • The Advanced Train Management System (ATMS) will deliver additional capacity and reliability, and help reduce infrastructure costs. • ARTC has attempted to get the best possible performance with the existing rail alignment. At some point deviations will need to be considered to gain further rail competitiveness.
