Re: James C on the roof MEL- ADL Was - Sightings of aus.rail'ers

[mauried@tpg.com.au (Maurie Daly)]

In article <5citlskc3b2fo6q4sa29jh3hv2ej9ftqpr@4ax.com> "< Tell >" <telljb@01.ozemail.com.au> writes:
>From: "< Tell >" <telljb@01.ozemail.com.au>
>Subject: Re: James C on the roof MEL- ADL Was - Sightings of aus.rail'ers
>Date: Sun, 02 Jul 2000 14:18:07 +0930

>mauried@tpg.com.au (Maurie Daly) wrote:
>> 
>> There are 3 major tunnels.
>> Sleeps hill tunnel between Lynton and Eden Hills ,this is a double track 
>> tunnel with both BG and SG.
>> National Park and Long Gully tunnels.
>> These are both between Belair and Mt Lofty loop.
>> Single track SG only.
>> All these tunnels are quite long and would be expensive to modify for 
>> double stacking purposes,if that was the intent.


>True Maurie, that was the reason why AN was looking at
>bypassing the Adelaide Hills many years ago.  
>Arrrrrg .....shrieks from the SA lurkers.



Its interesting that the only scheme Ive seen for bypassing the Adelaide Hills 
doesnt in fact bypass them at all.
This is the scheme for re aligning the eastern approach to the hills to give a 
maximum ruling gradient of 1:66.
Interestingly this scheme doesnt address the tunnel issue at all,and also 
doesnt address the more severe grades on the western side.

AN did look at a scheme to bypass the hills altogether but this scheme never 
seemed to see the light of day.

I must confess that while I like travelling thru the hills , schemes to half 
fix a problem , ie to fix only one side and not the other seem somewhat 
questionable at least.

Bypassing the hills altogether fixes both the tunnel problem and the grade 
problem.
It also allows the re guaging of the existing SG line back to BG to allow the 
STA if they so wished to again run suburban trains beyond belair and to recover
the lost double track to belair.

If we believe that Darwin is going to become a major port for Australia and 
that large amount of freight are going to be railed to and from Darwin ,then 
the Adelaide Hills will become an even bigger impediment than they are now.

MD