Subscribe to RSSBack To Normal? Sadly, No
Phew, the RWC is over and we can get back to using the trains as we used to.
Sadly no.
It’s the countdown to Christmas. That means another big rail network closedown so work on electrification and other improvements can be done without interruption.
But remember when we had weekend closures anyway?
They are starting again.
Closed for both Guy Fawkes Day Nov 5 and the Sunday, November 6:
WESTERN LINE: Waitakere to Britomart
SOUTHERN LINE: Papakura to Britomart via Newmarket
ONEHUNGA LINE: Onehunga to Britomart
EASTERN LINE: Papakura to Otahuhu
Train services will operate between Otahuhu and Britomart via Glen Innes only. Rail bus replacement services will operate on all other lines.
SWANSON: Soon there will be wires
Then a network closure on the weekend of Nov 12 and 13:
WESTERN LINE: Waitakere to Britomart
EASTERN LINE: Papakura to Britomart via Glen Innes
SOUTHERN LINE: Papakura to Otahuhu
Train services will operate between Otahuhu and Britomart via Newmarket and between Onehunga and Britomart only. Rail bus replacement services will operate on all other lines.
the Farmers Santa Parade is on November 27 - so there will be no disruptions and the rain date is Dec 4.
And Dec 17 and 18:
WESTERN LINE: Waitakere to Britomart
SOUTHERN LINE: Papakura to Britomart via Newmarket
ONEHUNGA LINE: Onehunga to Britomart
EASTERN LINE: Papakura to Otahuhu
Train services will operate between Otahuhu and Britomart via Glen Innes only. Rail bus replacement services will operate on all other lines.
Big projects ahead include:
- KiwiRail is replacing the Orakei Road rail bridge with a wider, higher bridge through the first half of 2012. There is a KiwiRail information day next Saturday- Orakei Bay, 231 Orakei Road, Auckland 11am to 2pm
- KiwiRail is doing below track works near the steam engine depot at Parnell in preparation for the proposed Parnell stop.
- The track has to be moved at Ellerslie to make way for the 4th Southern Motorway lane
- Western Line foundations for electrification continue along with the first sign of the actual wires
- Southern Line electrification masts continue
4 Comments
Ah!…the dreaded weekend trackwork. We have the same most weekends in Sydney but a few years ago, after much complaining by those regularly inconvenienced, common sense prevailed. Now we only work on one line at a time and concentrate the effort. Instead of one worksite on each line closing them all we have all the worksites on one line and close only one. All the same it is great to see the electrification proceeding. As for the caption above “SWANSON: Soon there will be wires” I hope that the powers that be realise the attractiveness of all that copper and energise it quickly otherwise soon it will be gone!
But weekend closures is getting back to normal but at least this weekend it’s still running
I have to agree that weekend closures is normal. It is for this reason I never use the trains on the weekends, it’s always a rail replacement when I need to use the trains. It’s just easier to use the buses since it is pretty much guaranteed it will run!
Peter, definitely agree about doing it all on one line at a time. Hopefully once electrification is completed they’ll start quality weekend timetables, so the level of inconvenience from a complete network shutdown will actually justify doing the same thing.
Right now, though, weekend services are so crap that it’s not a huge inconvenience to stop them entirely.