Tuggeranong - The Cinderella of the south

chewy14 said :

rubaiyat said :

I’m confused.

I was lead to believe by so many of the posters here that Tuggeranong was the very model of the ideal urban design.

Remote from the centre of the city, sprawling across the countryside far away from everywhere else, even its own town centre, broad expanses of expensive freeways the only mode of transport, impossible to get around without a car, and not just empty of any redeeming features but also devoid of life.

Just the way that those who chose it, want it.

Well it’s definitely better than most of the other new areas but definitely needs some infill densification around the major transport corridors and town centre.

The main problem however is the fact that West Murrumbidgee was never built leaving the town “centre” located on the fringe of the development area instead of in the middle where it was designed to be.

I wonder what could possibly fix that problem? Hmmmm.

Demolish the Brindabellas and sell it off as 420m2 blocks with cheek to cheek Macmansions?

Just looked up the stats for the Gold Coast Light Rail which runs 200 trams a day over a 19hr period from 0500 to midnight.

With over 18,200 passengers a day, and growing, that is 91 passengers per tram or 30% of their rated capacity.

As it stands the network can cater for 75,000 passengers a day with room to easily double that by running more frequent services or longer hours.

My mistake.

That solitary train fatality was for the whole of NSW not just Sydney.

As a measure of efficiency, standard rail uses 8.6% of the energy to move cargo than trucks.

That is due to the incredibly low friction of steel on steel.

Also the damage caused to the rights of way is equally as low with steel rails as opposed to heavy road vehicles due to the durable surface and smooth ride, with no brake damage on the pavement as with buses and trucks.

The calculation of energy used per passenger/km comes down to how much capacity of each vehicle is utilised. Also the figures are widely distorted by the tendency to quote US sources despite their statistics are not relevant to European/Australians public transport usage where it is seen as normal, not the last refugee of the impoverished.

Americans claim for example 1.55 occupants per car, which I found hard to believe when I was there, and 24.5 passengers per Light/Heavy Rail (whatever that was for. Per carriage?) There seemed to be just as few car passengers in the USA as here, where the research shows only 1.2 per car. Travelling last week regularly from Sydney’s Northern Beaches I found even that to be an exaggeration. Scarcely any cars had more than one occupant right in the middle of peak hour when the buses and trains were full.

There were also an alarming number of heavy 4WDs and SUVs, statistics show they are now the majority commuter car. Why do we even bother with roads? Just let them cut cross country!

Adjusting for a known rate of usage (Melbourne trams) of 55 – 98% rolling hour average, approx. 75% overall and the Australian car average of 1.2 occupants per vehicle, the US energy usage/passenger can be recalculated as:

Rail: 0.235 Mj per passenger km

Bus: 0.695 Mj per passenger km (based on Sydney ave passenger numbers being 4x US numbers)

Car: 2.995 Mj per passenger km

The ATOC report on transport in the UK calculates Passenger cars/taxis emit 86 x carbon emissions/passenger/km than rail.

Buses emit 6.5 x carbon emissions/passenger/km than rail.

btw In looking for these statistics I discovered that Sydney’s entire rail network, Commuter, Light Rail and Freight had 1 solitary fatality last year.

That’s the trouble with facts as opposed to “feelings”. They just ruin the Fairy Tales.

MarkE said :

One thing they won’t miss out on it the opportunity to pay for Gungahlin’s light rail. Phase 1 will cost $870M according to the Canberra Times. According to the ABS there are 151,000 households in the ACT so this Labor/Greens government will extort $5,166 plus interest plus the ongoing operating losses from every household in the ACT .

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

Put the two tracks of the Light Rail next to the multi-lanes of roads/freeways and see which uses the most steel and concrete:

Light Rail sleepers are only 2.5m wide and at 600mm centres, so only about 40% of the track area, weigh 280 kg and can be laid through grass. The rails weigh approx. 50 kg/m (200 kg/m for 2 tracks).

Sum total for the 2 Light Rail tracks is 929.6 tonnes of concrete sleepers and 200 tonnes for the rails per kilometre.

Total Light Rail 1130 tonnes/km.

Compare that to 4 lanes of freeway each 3.7m wide and approx. 28cm thick, plus the 2 extra emergency lane. Average 2.5 tonnes/m3 for reinforced concrete, 4 lanes + 2 laybys (3.7m x 6 x .28).

Total 4 lane freeway Freeway 6216 tonnes/km.

Light Rail vehicles can transport up to 270 people and weigh approx. 32 – 40 tonnes.

Replacing 4 – 5 buses which weigh 18 tonnes (2 axle) 25 tonnes (3 axle) approx 72 – 125 tonnes.

Replacing over 200 cars, half of which are 4WD/SUV to cater for the overweight drivers, approx. 300 tonnes.

This all ignores that the Light Rail tracks can transport as many passengers/hr as 24 lanes of freeway, and all in LESS space than two road lanes, which you can walk across with out being mown down.

A 24 lane freeway is over 110m wide and uses 49,728 tonnes/km of concrete.

MarkE said :

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

How do we opt out of paying for the roads you use that I probably don’t?

Oh as for buses, Action uses steel framed ones, so a CO2 cost there plus the cost of carrying around that weight. Action looked at aluminium framed buses (mostly made by a company called Volgren) but has never changed to that style.

As for natural gas, no operator in Australia has had any new natural gas buses for about 4-5 years now (Brisbane Transport the last). The reason being natural gas is not as clean as it is made out to be and it’s cost has gone through the roof. Euro VI diesels are cleaner and electricity cleaner again. European bus makers have developed Euro VI gas engines which in theory should be on par with Euro VI diesels, but doubt we will see many here due to the cost of gas.

It surprises me though we don’t have more hybrid buses, best of both worlds when it comes to buses.

Oh when it comes to light rail, fact electricity generated using natural gas or diesel and then used to power an electric motor is cleaner than a combustion motor on a vehicle, as large scale power plants are more efficient at extracting the energy out of the fuel. Though in this part of the world the bulk of our power is coal and hydro, both of which are more efficient again.

insider007 said :

Nilrem said :

MarkE said :

One thing they won’t miss out on it the opportunity to pay for Gungahlin’s light rail. Phase 1 will cost $870M according to the Canberra Times. According to the ABS there are 151,000 households in the ACT so this Labor/Greens government will extort $5,166 plus interest plus the ongoing operating losses from every household in the ACT .

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

You will benefit from the reduction in people looking for parking in Civic. Maybe you could complain about the roads being paved in Belconnen, because you don’t get any benefit from that?

Nilrem said :

MarkE said :

One thing they won’t miss out on it the opportunity to pay for Gungahlin’s light rail. Phase 1 will cost $870M according to the Canberra Times. According to the ABS there are 151,000 households in the ACT so this Labor/Greens government will extort $5,166 plus interest plus the ongoing operating losses from every household in the ACT .

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

You will benefit from the reduction in people looking for parking in Civic. Maybe you could complain about the roads being paved in Belconnen, because you don’t get any benefit from that?

Only paving don’t cost $800M.

Yes it does. All the gold plated road projects in the ACT have cost that much and more.

Pollute we must!

Nilrem said :

MarkE said :

One thing they won’t miss out on it the opportunity to pay for Gungahlin’s light rail. Phase 1 will cost $870M according to the Canberra Times. According to the ABS there are 151,000 households in the ACT so this Labor/Greens government will extort $5,166 plus interest plus the ongoing operating losses from every household in the ACT .

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

You will benefit from the reduction in people looking for parking in Civic. Maybe you could complain about the roads being paved in Belconnen, because you don’t get any benefit from that?

Nilrem said :

MarkE said :

One thing they won’t miss out on it the opportunity to pay for Gungahlin’s light rail. Phase 1 will cost $870M according to the Canberra Times. According to the ABS there are 151,000 households in the ACT so this Labor/Greens government will extort $5,166 plus interest plus the ongoing operating losses from every household in the ACT .

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

You will benefit from the reduction in people looking for parking in Civic. Maybe you could complain about the roads being paved in Belconnen, because you don’t get any benefit from that?

Only paving don’t cost $800M.

MarkE said :

One thing they won’t miss out on it the opportunity to pay for Gungahlin’s light rail. Phase 1 will cost $870M according to the Canberra Times. According to the ABS there are 151,000 households in the ACT so this Labor/Greens government will extort $5,166 plus interest plus the ongoing operating losses from every household in the ACT .

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

You will benefit from the reduction in people looking for parking in Civic. Maybe you could complain about the roads being paved in Belconnen, because you don’t get any benefit from that?

One thing they won’t miss out on it the opportunity to pay for Gungahlin’s light rail. Phase 1 will cost $870M according to the Canberra Times. According to the ABS there are 151,000 households in the ACT so this Labor/Greens government will extort $5,166 plus interest plus the ongoing operating losses from every household in the ACT .

That is just great. My family gets to pay more than $5,166 through extra rates and charges for a light rail system we will never use. HOW DO WE OPT OUT?

While the morons who govern the ACT talk about 90% renewable energy at extra cost to all of us. Have they thought about how much CO2 will be released in the manufacture of the steel and concrete to be used in the light rail project? Compared to some extra bus lanes and buses running on natural gas it will take centuries to break even on emissions with the bus alternative.

gazket said :

Just too add to that. Our Last federal Labour government is a prime example of our dead head governments. They gave away billions to other countries and invested here at home the BER, Pink Bats and set top boxes and a myriad of other garbage. Now we are paying for it and have no money for cream.

Thought I’d help you out with data as opposed to Liberal soundbites:

http://i612.photobucket.com/albums/tt206/tipsntricks/Oz_USA_FTA.png

The result of the Australia – USA Free Trade Agreement, negotiated and signed by the LNP, has been a net gift to the USA of US$96 billion so far. The onerous extensions to copyright and patents will ensure that continues in perpetuity. The USA Agricultural Subsidies stay in place, we have been banned from doing the same. Before the “FTA” Australia had actually been closing the gap with the USA Trade deficit.

The Australia – Thai Free Trade Agreement was even worse, putting an end to the lucrative Australian car exports (one of the supposed beneficiaries of the FTA) to Thailand and probably being one of the nails in the coffin of that industry.

The LNP is now doing this all over again with China. Their ideological dogmatism is what is driving our Trade Deficit and economy through the floor.

This Government talks big about Team Australia, but as usual is playing NFL not AFL.

JC said :

Garfield said :

JC said :

Garfield said :

One contributing factor I didn’t see mentioned was the ACT government’s changes to the first home buyer concessions a few years ago, where they were limited to newly constructed homes. This encouraged many younger Tuggers residents to move north and skewed the demographics of the valley. As a result it’s likely that Tuggeranong residents aren’t having enough babies to maintain the population. Tuggeranong needs new construction of affordable first homes or there needs to be a change to the law allowing first home buyers to access concessions for existing homes purchased. If I remember correctly the Libs promised to do the latter during 2012, so it may still be part of their platform next year.

Considering the cost of housing in Gungahlin is for the most part more expensive, I seriously doubt the change to the first home buyers grant is encouraging people to move out. It would be like spending $50k to save $12k (or what ever it is these days).

Maybe the younger generation are making the choice to move to somewhere nearer, or more to the point probably to the units that are/have been built along the Flemmington Road corridor. Many young people these days don’t want houses with yards, and many cannot afford them anyway even in Tuggernaong.

One thing that is missed with the debate about Tuggeranong is it is the only township that is a double hop from the city. It is for this reason that it lacks facilities that other town centres have, for the most part Tuggeranong is a dormitory town of Woden, so Woden is where the bulk of the facilities are.

Also makes it hard to build things like Uni’s as Tuggernong is central to no where, whereas if you look where the hospitals, Uni’s etc are they are generally central to the population as a whole, just not Tuggernong. Not hard to get to either.

When it comes to buying a first home, saving for the deposit is a key component, and an extra $12,000 can be the difference between being able to buy a place or not. I had a look on Allhomes and while there looked to be more properties in Tuggeranong between $300-400,000 than there were in Gungahlin, there were still a good number listed there. In terms of travel times, northern and eastern Tuggeranong are just as close to the city as northern and western Belconnen, so I’m not sure that distance is a huge issue.

Think you will find that banks don’t include first home buyers grants in their deposit calculations.

And yeah northern and eastern Tuggernaong are just as close to the city as the extremities of Belconnen. But the majority of Tuggernanong is not in the north of the township. I do agree for the most part the distance doesn’t make a difference to those who live there (I live in west Belconnen for way of comparison). But it does make a hell of a big difference to provision of public transport, and facilities that are for the benifit of the city as a whole. Eg Hospitals etc.

I don’t know if its changed now, but when I received my first home owners grant it was definitely included in deposit calculations. The Monaro Highway can provide quick access to the city for eastern Tuggeranong suburbs as well, and combined with the northern ones it probably comes to more than half of Tuggers.

Garfield said :

JC said :

Garfield said :

One contributing factor I didn’t see mentioned was the ACT government’s changes to the first home buyer concessions a few years ago, where they were limited to newly constructed homes. This encouraged many younger Tuggers residents to move north and skewed the demographics of the valley. As a result it’s likely that Tuggeranong residents aren’t having enough babies to maintain the population. Tuggeranong needs new construction of affordable first homes or there needs to be a change to the law allowing first home buyers to access concessions for existing homes purchased. If I remember correctly the Libs promised to do the latter during 2012, so it may still be part of their platform next year.

Considering the cost of housing in Gungahlin is for the most part more expensive, I seriously doubt the change to the first home buyers grant is encouraging people to move out. It would be like spending $50k to save $12k (or what ever it is these days).

Maybe the younger generation are making the choice to move to somewhere nearer, or more to the point probably to the units that are/have been built along the Flemmington Road corridor. Many young people these days don’t want houses with yards, and many cannot afford them anyway even in Tuggernaong.

One thing that is missed with the debate about Tuggeranong is it is the only township that is a double hop from the city. It is for this reason that it lacks facilities that other town centres have, for the most part Tuggeranong is a dormitory town of Woden, so Woden is where the bulk of the facilities are.

Also makes it hard to build things like Uni’s as Tuggernong is central to no where, whereas if you look where the hospitals, Uni’s etc are they are generally central to the population as a whole, just not Tuggernong. Not hard to get to either.

When it comes to buying a first home, saving for the deposit is a key component, and an extra $12,000 can be the difference between being able to buy a place or not. I had a look on Allhomes and while there looked to be more properties in Tuggeranong between $300-400,000 than there were in Gungahlin, there were still a good number listed there. In terms of travel times, northern and eastern Tuggeranong are just as close to the city as northern and western Belconnen, so I’m not sure that distance is a huge issue.

Think you will find that banks don’t include first home buyers grants in their deposit calculations.

And yeah northern and eastern Tuggernaong are just as close to the city as the extremities of Belconnen. But the majority of Tuggernanong is not in the north of the township. I do agree for the most part the distance doesn’t make a difference to those who live there (I live in west Belconnen for way of comparison). But it does make a hell of a big difference to provision of public transport, and facilities that are for the benifit of the city as a whole. Eg Hospitals etc.

rubaiyat said :

I’m confused.

I was lead to believe by so many of the posters here that Tuggeranong was the very model of the ideal urban design.

Remote from the centre of the city, sprawling across the countryside far away from everywhere else, even its own town centre, broad expanses of expensive freeways the only mode of transport, impossible to get around without a car, and not just empty of any redeeming features but also devoid of life.

Just the way that those who chose it, want it.

Well it’s definitely better than most of the other new areas but definitely needs some infill densification around the major transport corridors and town centre.

The main problem however is the fact that West Murrumbidgee was never built leaving the town “centre” located on the fringe of the development area instead of in the middle where it was designed to be.

I wonder what could possibly fix that problem? Hmmmm.

gazket said :

Just too add to that. Our Last federal Labour government is a prime example of our dead head governments. They gave away billions to other countries and invested here at home the BER, Pink Bats and set top boxes and a myriad of other garbage. Now we are paying for it and have no money for cream.

Please explain why the budget deficit now is even bigger than it was under Labor, and will continue to grow.

gazket said :

Just too add to that. Our Last federal Labour government is a prime example of our dead head governments. They gave away billions to other countries and invested here at home the BER, Pink Bats and set top boxes and a myriad of other garbage. Now we are paying for it and have no money for cream.

The Liberals and Nationals have given away vastly more with their amateurly negotiated “Free Trade” Agreements. They gifted at least a trillion dollars to American corporatations with 75 year IPRs, unbalanced trade access and outsourcing tailored to US Multinationals.

They allowed the long standing rorting of our taxation system by major corporations and countless billions more into attacking Iraq our biggest market in the Middle East. Helping the Americans trash the place then letting the Americans pick up our markets in return for services rendered.

The current comedy act in Canberra is doing this all over again with China.

For various reasons, including one big, obvious (toot! toot!) reason, there’s unlikely to be funding to do anything beyond the tokenistic for Tuggeranong, but if nothing else, it should have market forces on its side in the form of (relatively) more affordable housing, compared to the more fashionable parts of town.

Just too add to that. Our Last federal Labour government is a prime example of our dead head governments. They gave away billions to other countries and invested here at home the BER, Pink Bats and set top boxes and a myriad of other garbage. Now we are paying for it and have no money for cream.

I’m sorry but Tuggers is no different to Woden or Belco. The grass always seems greener on the other side.

Your saying we need more Public servants and school kids to keep the Malls operating ?

All it will do is pump up Westfield’s and all the world wide franchises that fill the malls and most of that money goes over seas tax free. The money doesn’t stay here to improve the town centre.

Over the years and still ongoing our governments have ensured our spent money is getting bundled up and sent overseas. Until that changes we are in the shit and it’s getting deeper.

So us placing more public servants in town centres won’t do a thing in the long run it’s a short term fix until the next X-pollie says we need more public servants in the town centres. Look what Belco has.

JC said :

Garfield said :

One contributing factor I didn’t see mentioned was the ACT government’s changes to the first home buyer concessions a few years ago, where they were limited to newly constructed homes. This encouraged many younger Tuggers residents to move north and skewed the demographics of the valley. As a result it’s likely that Tuggeranong residents aren’t having enough babies to maintain the population. Tuggeranong needs new construction of affordable first homes or there needs to be a change to the law allowing first home buyers to access concessions for existing homes purchased. If I remember correctly the Libs promised to do the latter during 2012, so it may still be part of their platform next year.

Considering the cost of housing in Gungahlin is for the most part more expensive, I seriously doubt the change to the first home buyers grant is encouraging people to move out. It would be like spending $50k to save $12k (or what ever it is these days).

Maybe the younger generation are making the choice to move to somewhere nearer, or more to the point probably to the units that are/have been built along the Flemmington Road corridor. Many young people these days don’t want houses with yards, and many cannot afford them anyway even in Tuggernaong.

One thing that is missed with the debate about Tuggeranong is it is the only township that is a double hop from the city. It is for this reason that it lacks facilities that other town centres have, for the most part Tuggeranong is a dormitory town of Woden, so Woden is where the bulk of the facilities are.

Also makes it hard to build things like Uni’s as Tuggernong is central to no where, whereas if you look where the hospitals, Uni’s etc are they are generally central to the population as a whole, just not Tuggernong. Not hard to get to either.

When it comes to buying a first home, saving for the deposit is a key component, and an extra $12,000 can be the difference between being able to buy a place or not. I had a look on Allhomes and while there looked to be more properties in Tuggeranong between $300-400,000 than there were in Gungahlin, there were still a good number listed there. In terms of travel times, northern and eastern Tuggeranong are just as close to the city as northern and western Belconnen, so I’m not sure that distance is a huge issue.

I’m confused.

I was lead to believe by so many of the posters here that Tuggeranong was the very model of the ideal urban design.

Remote from the centre of the city, sprawling across the countryside far away from everywhere else, even its own town centre, broad expanses of expensive freeways the only mode of transport, impossible to get around without a car, and not just empty of any redeeming features but also devoid of life.

Just the way that those who chose it, want it.

Garfield said :

One contributing factor I didn’t see mentioned was the ACT government’s changes to the first home buyer concessions a few years ago, where they were limited to newly constructed homes. This encouraged many younger Tuggers residents to move north and skewed the demographics of the valley. As a result it’s likely that Tuggeranong residents aren’t having enough babies to maintain the population. Tuggeranong needs new construction of affordable first homes or there needs to be a change to the law allowing first home buyers to access concessions for existing homes purchased. If I remember correctly the Libs promised to do the latter during 2012, so it may still be part of their platform next year.

Considering the cost of housing in Gungahlin is for the most part more expensive, I seriously doubt the change to the first home buyers grant is encouraging people to move out. It would be like spending $50k to save $12k (or what ever it is these days).

Maybe the younger generation are making the choice to move to somewhere nearer, or more to the point probably to the units that are/have been built along the Flemmington Road corridor. Many young people these days don’t want houses with yards, and many cannot afford them anyway even in Tuggernaong.

One thing that is missed with the debate about Tuggeranong is it is the only township that is a double hop from the city. It is for this reason that it lacks facilities that other town centres have, for the most part Tuggeranong is a dormitory town of Woden, so Woden is where the bulk of the facilities are.

Also makes it hard to build things like Uni’s as Tuggernong is central to no where, whereas if you look where the hospitals, Uni’s etc are they are generally central to the population as a whole, just not Tuggernong. Not hard to get to either.

One contributing factor I didn’t see mentioned was the ACT government’s changes to the first home buyer concessions a few years ago, where they were limited to newly constructed homes. This encouraged many younger Tuggers residents to move north and skewed the demographics of the valley. As a result it’s likely that Tuggeranong residents aren’t having enough babies to maintain the population. Tuggeranong needs new construction of affordable first homes or there needs to be a change to the law allowing first home buyers to access concessions for existing homes purchased. If I remember correctly the Libs promised to do the latter during 2012, so it may still be part of their platform next year.