Re: Phantom trackwork 4/9/1999-5/9/1999

["Bill McNiven" <wmcniven@gunzel.ozemail.com.au>]

Hubert Lam wrote in message <7qge5l$msn$1@news1.mpx.com.au>...
>What is this work they're doing between North Strathfield<-->Strathfield
and
>the inner west (local) line this weekend?
>
On Saturday 4th, this was a very interesting question!

Travelled by V set from Sydney to Eastwood and return to see that there was
NO work between Strathfield and North Strathfield (but local trains were
replaced by buses!).

There was lots of work on track, points and signal cabling closing the Local
lines Illawarra Junction (Flying Junctions?) to Homebush and the Suburban
lines Illawarra Junction to Lidcombe (exclusive).

The train service operated on the Main Lines in the afternoon looked like
Penrith (4 trains / hour), Riverstone / Richmond (2 trains / hour),
Campbelltown via Granville (2 trains / hour), Liverpool via OLYMPIC PARK and
Regent's Park (2 trains / hour), Bankstown via OLYMPIC PARK and Regent's
Park (2 trains / hour), Blue Mountains (1 train / hour) and Central Coast (2
trains / hour) -- a total of 15 trains / hour.

The Liverpool and Bankstown via Regent's Park trains, normally all-stations,
were altered to run express to Strathfield, then via Olympic Park to
Lidcombe.  (There was a Rugby League match at Stadium Australia.)

The Glenfield via Granville and Hornsby via Strathfield services were simply
cancelled.  I *suspect* that 15 trains / hour is considered to be the
practical maximum to run on one pair of tracks through Strathfield.

IMHO, more customer-friendly approaches to the capacity constraint might
have been to cut the Penrith service and leave the Hornsby trains in, or to
run the Hornsby trains into Strathfield Platform 1 to terminate.

Rgds

Bill

PS:  Regent's Park has an apostrophe!