Agenda items for proposed meeting with Kevin O'Keefe, CEO Dudley MBC

 

1. Black Country Cycle-Walk Mudway
2. Housing in line with you all declaring a climate emergency and then doing nothing.
3. Cycle-walkway on the opposite side of Duncan Edwards Way from the tramline.
4. Stourbridge Jct to Round Oak/Harts' Hill by ... ?
5. Why ultra-light rail, VLR, LR and HR all on one mainline HR railway?
6. Urgent repairs to most of Dudley's stiles out in our southern greenbelt/Golden Green Triangle bounded by M5, A456, A491.  I'm so ancient, I'm struggling to climb them even when they are not rickety!
7. West Midlands National Park progress
8. Nice, new Dudley Central Mosque for our Muslim brethren.
9. Dudley Leisure Centre site in Wellington Road
10. Regional Fare-Free Public Transport for all.
11. Is declaring a climate emergency consistent with spending billions of pounds of greenhouse gases on a multi-modal, mass rapid transit public transport system?  This, when it is heavily dependant on steel and cement that have high greenhouse gas emissions.

FOR UK TRAM AT TRANSPORT HQ

How do you distinguish between light rail and heavy rail?

When is a tram a train and a train a tram?

Is it sensible to have on a former mainline railway between Worcester and Derby, a conversion that will eventually mean, at best, two changes?  One from train to tram at Stourbridge Jct and a second change from tram to train at Walsall station to get to Derby.

Or, it might mean, from train to ultra-light rail at Stourbridge Jct to Brierley Hill; change to light rail to Wednesbury for the bus to Walsall railway station to get the train, again for Derby.

How do all these changes make sense in encouraging users to move from car driving to public transport?

The tram train on the Black Country Rail Line

Here are my points for being apprehensive over ultra light rail going on the Black Country Line:

1. It gives you all an excuse for further delay to get down to increasing rail capacity, especially when it is so important to take the pressure off New Street Station.
2. Once ultra light rail is in place, it will be very difficult not to extend it in bite sized chunks, as was the intention with Metro.  The bite sized chunks business never materialised for Metro, so that is a bad omen for very light rail.
3. Once ultra light rail is in place, it will be difficult to then rip it up and replace it with heavy rail.  Better to put back the everyday, well tried and tested, heavy rail trains, with stations.
4. Heavy rail can be put back quicker than an innovative tram train that still needs much development.
5. Nick Mallinson confirmed that what his WMG is developing is unheard of on the mainland of Europe that is generally considered to have an excellent rail service from Spain and Italy to Scandanavia.
6. Ultra light rail would be ideal for urban areas that have no heavy rail tracks already in place.  Best to use existing heavy rail tracks for heavy rail trains.
7. Nick wants one track as a test track and the other one for a shuttle service for the tram train.  From John Parry's experience in taking very many years to put his already tried and tested PPM on the Stourbridge branch line, it is bound to take a similar number of years to get permission for the tram train to be able to be safe for a public service.
8. John Parry had his own circular test track for many years at his business address in Cradley.  Should Nick not be using that?
9. In other words, it will take years for the tram train to be safe and sufficiently reliable for a public paying shuttle service between Castle Hill and Dudley Port.
10. There are two possible better locations for an innovative vehicle to be tried and tested.  One might be the open space that once took the Dudley to Wolverhampton rail line before it was built on, further on.  There is space there for them to test the tram train between Station Drive and on to the rear of the Black Country Museum and directly to the Dudley Canal Trust.  The other might be the old line, branching off the Black Country Line, from Silver End in Brierley Hill, through Brockmoor to Pensnett.