The Metro option
The four Valley routes transferring from Network Rail to Transport for Wales are Aberdare, Rhymney, Treherbet and Merthyr. The boundary will be just past Cardiff Queen Street.
Some 106 miles of electrification is required to support the plans, and the transfer will happen via a Transport & Works Act Order. That will be applied for soon, and then KeolisAmey will lease it from the Welsh Government. It is planned that this will be from September 2019.
Up to 15% of the work can be selfdelivered, and this will be done by Amey. In the meantime, work continues on the final designs.
KeolisAmey Mobilisation Director Colin Lea tells RAIL: “We have been clever in terms of spending - we kept high-floor trams like in Manchester, which means no work on platforms. That is experience gained from Manchester and Europe. We won’t need to do Cardiff resignalling as a result of this.”
The 36 three-car tram-trains are of the Stadler Citylink design that is used across Europe, with Chemnitz in Germany probably the most high-profile. The Class 399s in Sheffield are a variant, but the Welsh tram-trains will have a standard wheel profile, even on on-road sections. That is cheaper, explains Lea. TfW is also keeping them as 25kV - there is no split voltage.
In the more open sections, the trains will run on batteries. The tri-mode Stadler trains can run for 40 miles, but the tram-train is about balancing the weight and power. As they don’t need to travel significant distances, so their range is four miles.
Plug-in points will be fitted for the batteries to ensure the trains can ‘get home’. Trackside beacons will control where the power is switched on, and there will be no need for trains to stop.
The mid-floor height on the trains helps not only Persons of Reduced Mobility, but also those with bikes, bags and sticks. They have a retractable step that works at every station stop.
Lea explains: “We noticed how ‘peaky’ Cardiff is. Outside of that it quickly falls to off-peak levels, but that 1700-1800 period is super busy. That is a challenge, and one we will hopefully change through the light rail model. The specification was that nobody can stand more than 20 minutes.”