I think an alternative way of putting it is that it would be optimistic to have short-workings formally scheduled in when the whole operation is constantly subject to unexpected disruption. They have their hands full as it is. Be grateful for accidental "crisis management" short-workings, for which double-ended trams and bustitution were surely invented!

The loop I designed had very little impact on Shanahan park but my current position is that a two-track stub would do the job, given the need for close proximity to DH Station.

They would have "more" rolling stock (that is, availability) if they put a bit of go into the operation and achieved a shorter journey time and thus turn trams around more quickly. That way you can provide more services with the same number of trams.

Tony P
---InTramsDownUnder@..., <arg@...> wrote :

I’ve seen short working to Lewisham West, on one occasion when the terminus points at Dulwich Hill had failed, but for unknown reasons at other times.

With the standard of timekeeping and frequency discipline I don’t see how interference with through cars would make much of a difference at any of the potential short working points (John St Pyrmont, Wentworth Park, Lilyfield, Lewisham West), and at Lilyfield the stabling siding could be used to reverse cars clear of the Up line. With current loadings (the tram I caught home on Friday at 2.40 or thereabouts from Haymarket was packed tight, and still with standees when I got off at Taverners Hill) shortage of rolling stock is the big problem, and I think short workings to Lilyfield or Lewisham West would be a way of relieving overcrowding by separating short and long distance passengers.

When I grew up in Drummoyne a lot of peak hour bus services were first set downs at various points along Victoria Rd, with Westbourne St Drummoyne (the traffic lights just before the Gladesville bridge) the most common first set down point. That would possibly be hard to enforce without conductors though on the trams.

As for a balloon loop at Dulwich Hill, alienating any parkland to build it would raise a lot of ire in the community, which is feeling very under siege with the metro being imposed on the Bankstown line - a community group called the Corridor Alliance has been formed to oppose it and it is growing rapidly. Along with the Westconnex atrocity the metro proposal among those it impacts on is as popular as leprosy, despite the reams of propaganda and PR bullshit being pumped into the area by the state government.

Tony G