Investing in the future of Blackpool’s tram network

The Blackpool tramway has been in existence for over 120 years, and so a scheme to upgrade the system, approved by the Government in June 2009, is a project that will ensure the tram network has a great future ahead. Craig Waters, Commissioning Editor of Intelligent Transport met with Paul Grocott, Programme Manager of the Tramway Upgrade from Blackpool Council, who explained the project details and what aspects of the scheme will help improve journey times and the accessibility of the tramway for all passengers.

The tramway upgrade will cost a fraction over £100 million and will include new trams, replacement of 8km of track, new stops and a new tram depot.

“Blackpool Council is a relatively small authority,” explains Mr. Grocott, “but we understood that certain sections of the track could become life expired so we started a process of investment primarily for track renewals and up until quite recently we replaced 10km of track over the total route length of 18km route length at a cost of £20 million.”

The first section of the tramway opened in 1885. Mr. Grocott explained that due to having been in continuous operation, the system has not been updated to current legislation. This is an important point to highlight because due to its continuous operation, the Blackpool tramway has been operating with dispensation from current legislation. However, this would not continue indefinitely, and without confirmation of recent investment to ensure compliance with current legislation, the tramway would be reduced to a short heritage operation.

So, further infrastructure replacement was recognised as an important factor, but so also was the importance of investing in new rolling stock.

Mr. Grocott explained, “The last vehicles that Blackpool Transport Services purchased were the Centenary cars which, as the name suggests, were purchased 100 years after the tramway was opened. All other vehicles in operation are heritage trams, and although some have been modified and refurbished, this was only for cosmetic and structural reasons.”

Mr. Grocott states, “The tramway has to be fully compliant with the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 and how that applies to the tramways, which is known as The Rail Vehicle Accessibility Regulations (RVAR).”

“These regulations need to be met by 2020 at the latest and the existing tramway is nowhere near compliant,” says Mr. Grocott.

The regulations require easy access into vehicles through level boarding, with no steps. They also require space inside the trams for wheelchairs and pushchairs and spaces for priority seating.

“The way the existing trams were constructed doesn’t allow them to be modified,” said Mr. Grocott. “We did consider it – but the amount of modification required led us to decide on procuring new vehicles instead.”

Another important aspect to mention here is the RSPG – Railway Safety Principles and Guidance. The responsibility for the regulation of health and safety on railways and tramways rests with the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR). Guidance for tramways is set out in the Railway Safety Publication 2 (RSP2), which includes extensive information on vehicles, tram-stops, highway junctions and pedestrian crossings. Again, neither the existing vehicles nor the existing tramway infrastructure complies with the requirements of the guidance, and the upgrade of the tramway is therefore essential.

Advantages of upgrading the tramway

One of the many benefits that this upgrade scheme will bring is to speed up the service and Mr. Grocott says that the upgrade will reduce the end-to-end time by approximately 15 minutes.

“We will be running fully compliant, modern low-floor trams with better acceleration and deceleration characteristics,” says Mr. Grocott. “They will provide increased capacity, far greater than what we have already got and with the inclusion of multiple doors, it will be quicker and easier for people to load and alight the vehicles.”

Spaces for wheelchairs users etc will be created onboard the trams. New platforms will also be built, ensuring they are fully accessible for mobility impaired passengers. Overall, the scheme will ensure that not only is legislation met but that the new system will provide a much better environment for everyone.

Mr. Grocott explained that there are certain speed limits on the tramway which will remain in force so they are not going to increase the travelling speed of the trams – the time will be gained through better acceleration and deceleration characteristics of the trams. Another time-saving aspect will be made at highway crossings where priority signalling will be implemented.

In theory the tramway has priority over cars, but in reality this is not always the case as road users often leave tram drivers with no alternative but to stop!

Mr. Grocott explained that there are actually very few accidents between trams and cars, but due to tram drivers having to stop intermittently at highway crossings, this slows down the service.

“The upgrade project will entail the signalling work at 14 of those junctions – providing 11 with new signalling systems and changing the controllers at three of the existing ones,” says Mr. Grocott.

Traffic will also be prohibited from crossing the tramway on four road sections which is another factor which will greatly increase the journey speed.

Who is involved?

“Having a relationship with the public during the duration of the project is very important and the public have already responded very well and positively to the plans,” explains Mr. Grocott. “Public consultations/forums have been arranged and more will be arranged in the future along the different stages of the project and the council will release more and more information to the public as the scheme develops to keep them updated accordingly.”

Mr. Grocott explained that a “management group” was set up comprising approximately 25 different representatives and stakeholders within the area including, among others, seafront businesses, the emergency services, beach patrol, the RNLI and the Pleasure Beach.

There are three local authorities involved with the project – Blackpool Council and Lancashire County Council are both key to the scheme and Wyre Borough Council.

In addition to this are the three core contracts in the scheme:

• Bombardier will produce the new trams
• Bam Nuttall will build the track works, tram stops and highway junctions
• VolkerFitzpatrick will build the new depot

Funding

The total amount of funding for the upgrade project is £101.67 million. The DfT (Department for Transport) is contributing £68.285 million from the Regional Funding Allocation budget and additional funds are coming from Lancashire County Council with £15.25 million and Blackpool Council is contributing £17.75 million.

The upgrade project is also benefiting from some European money, with a contribution of approximately €825,000 from the INTERREG IVB North West Europe Programme – a financial instrument of the European Union’s Cohesion Policy which funds projects that support transnational cooperation. The aim is to find innovative ways to make the most of territorial assets and tackle shared problems of Member States, regions and other authorities.

Forming part of this European Union regional policy, is a cooperation project called TramStore21, which aims to ensure that the construction of tram depots abides by the three aspects of sustainable development: economic, social, environmental.

TramStore21 is both directed and coordinated by STIB – the public transport operator in Brussels. Blackpool Council is a project partner involved with this and so are:

• RET – public transport operator in Rotterdam, Netherlands
• Communauté de l’Agglomération Dijonnaise, France – the Dijon metropolitan area
• The Fraunhofer Institute for Logistics, Dortmund, Germany

Between 2008 and 2013, these partners will be cooperating and exchanging their technical expertise with a view to optimising depot constructing. For further information about TramStore21, please visit www.tramstore21.eu.

Budget and timescales

The major success for rolling out any infrastructure project is dependent on a good working relationship with all other associated members.

“I set the budget and put the contracts together,” explains Mr. Grocott. “All the contracts we have got are lump sum, design and construct fixed price contracts. The terms and conditions ensure that the majority of the risks are passed across to the three contractors. Each of the contracts says that they must liaise with each other as a group. Each of the contracts defines when certain information or certain things have to be done for the other and the responsibility rests with that contractor.”

Mr. Grocott explains that they didn’t want to pick a consortium to do everything. “We wanted the ability to pick the depot contractor, to pick the trackworks contractor and more importantly to pick the vehicle manufacturer. We’ve had the first interface meeting with all of them which went very well, and they have the requirement to talk to other contractors. The responsibility is in place for the first tram to turn up at the end of May 2011, and the depot must be complete before the first tram turns up. The other requirement is for the trackworks contractor to link the main line to the depot before that date and also to provide certain sections of track to allow us to have a decent enough run to do the testing.”

The approach that Mr. Grocott took for this project was to look at the procurement very carefully. “We looked at what other projects in the industry have done right or wrong and we’ve learnt from them, and I think we have got three very reputable contractors on board. The selection wasn’t based on price alone – it has been based upon a significant number of factors – we had to be sure that we were going to get the right people – and I think we have.”

The trams

The vehicles will be single-deck with an appearance similar to most European cities. They will be approximately 32m long with multiple doors and a seating capacity of up to 70 people. Space will be made available for wheelchairs and mobility impaired passengers with priority seating.

CCTV will be fitted externally on the new trams as a driver aid, and also at the door areas and inside the vehicles for added security.

Mr. Grocott explains, “legislation says that we have to provide audible and visual passenger information systems onboard the vehicles.” The trams will be equipped with such technology to announce the current stop, the next stop and the final destination.

Driving and maintaining the current trams will be completely different from the new trams, so a training routine has to be carried out for both drivers and maintenance staff, which will be conducted by Bombardier as part of their contract.

The track

For the ballasted sections of track, Mr. Grocott explains that the construction will be no different to conventional railway. “They will just remove the existing track, take out the ballast, dig down to formation, put in drainage, geotextile layer, new ballast and then sleepers and then weld the rail together.”

On the ballasted sections of track, long welded rail has been chosen in accordance with Network Rail standards.

“We tried to design the track to last in Blackpool. What we are designing to some degree is a heavy freight railway. We’ve got 113A flat bottom rail on conventional concrete sleepers and on Network Rail standard ballast – so it is a heavy freight railway even though we will run trams on it with much lower axle loads.”

Concerning the concrete paved sections of track, the durability has been specifically looked at and Mr. Grocott explains that they have learnt from other systems.

“We will have a grooved rail section (RA R16 R1) which will be fully encapsulated and provides a substantial rubber block from the toe of the rail to the head of the rail. This will provide greater durability and will minimise noise, vibration and movement in the rail.”

Stops and platforms

“Legislation tells us that we don’t have to provide real-time passenger information, but we are currently looking at basic information systems. Nevertheless, the stops will look completely different to anything that we have currently got,” says Mr. Grocott.

Wherever possible, the stops will have platforms approximately 280mm high, 32m long and 3.1m wide with ramps to ground level and shelters will be provided at most stops and will comply fully with the Disability Discrimination Act and all other relevant legislation.

The depot

The existing depot at Rigby Road is a combined bus and tram depot and it has no space left. The facilities used are based upon the ability to maintain the current vehicles.

“The equipment that we’ve currently got is not suitable to maintain the new trams, and even so, there isn’t any room to stable the new 16 vehicles. So that meant we had to provide a new facility to accommodate this.”

The new tram depot facility will be at Starr Gate on an area currently occupied by a go-cart track and a public car park. Once built, the depot will comfortably stable and maintain the 16 new trams. Its appearance will have to be a suitable standard considering the sites prominent position on a major route along the promenade. Sitting alongside the sea wall, the new designs are quite eye-catching.

“We’ve tried to design a building which everybody can be proud of, and we’ve taken a ‘sea’ theme in the construction of it. The roof reflects the waves of the sea with broken-up sections to let natural light inside. On the highway elevation there will be a 3D cladding of a wave effect which will also have programmable LED’s which can contribute to the famous illuminations of Blackpool.”