The performance and potential of rail stations in and outside freeway medians

The performance and potential of rail stations in and outside freeway medians: the application of a node/place model to Perth

Courtney Babb1, Anthony Duckworth-Smith2, Ryan Falconer3, Richard Isted4, Doina Olaru5, Sharon Biermann5

1Planning and Transport Research Centre (PATREC), Curtin University

2Australian Urban Design Research Centre, University of Western Australia

3ARUP, Perth, Western Australia

4Jacobs, Perth, Western Australia

5PATREC, University of Western Australia

Email for correspondence:

Abstract

In some global cities new rail infrastructure is located within freeway medians. This is primarily due to spatial constraints inherent in existing urban areas and the opportunity to avoid land resumption for major transport infrastructure. In Perth, WA the opening of the Joondalup (1991) and Mandurah (2007) railway lines delivered 22 new stations, most located within the freeway median. The historic Midland, Armadale/Thornlie and Fremantle lines were not constructed in freeway medians. State Government planning policy has identified many of the new stations as activity centres for future higher residential development and land-use intensity. A planning challenge for development in these precincts is to address the current and future conflict between the mobility needs of the car, and those of public transport, walking, and cycling. Many of the precincts have remnant low-density development, feature fragmented land tenure and represent the effects of past auto-centric policy.The Node/Place model developed by Bertolini (1996) has been used to analyse the land-use and transport functions of rail station precincts in several cities around the world. This paper reports on a new application of an extended node/place model to 13 rail stations in the Perth metropolitan area, identified by WA State planning policy as activity centres. A tri-dimensional analysis – Node, Place and Background Traffic – was conducted of stations located within and outside freeway medians, and of stations on heritage lines for the purpose of comparison. Performance was captured using43 indicators. The findings suggest that achieving the balance of Node and Place function associated with stations in freeway medians is problematic and a more effective policy setting may be to emphasise Node functions.The work also makes a unique contribution to TOD research by assessing how background traffic conditions influence node/ place functionality and related policy opportunities.

1.Introduction

The mutual benefits of co-locating public transport nodes and areas of higher intensity, mixed use and walkable development, traditionally termed Transit-Oriented Development (TOD), have been well recognised and studied in the literature (Bertolini 1999, Cerveroet al. 2002). Achieving transport and land use integration through TODs has been a popular planning policy in Australian cities in the last decade (Curtis et al. 2009), including Perth. The strategic planning agenda for metropolitan Perth and Peel is strongly predicated on a hierarchy of more broadly termed, activity centres, most but not all of which are spatially associated with train stations. Despite this strong planning tradition, while rail patronage has escalated in the last two decades in response to the construction of northern Joondalup (early 1990’s) and southern Mandurah (2007) rail lines, development of activity centres around stations in most cases, has not materialised to anywhere near planning expectations. A number of contributing factors have been postulated, not least of which is the location of stations within or adjacent to freeway medians. This paper examines the performance and potential of transport and land use function of 13 rail stations in the Perth metropolitan area, identified by WA State planning policy as activity centres.

2. Background

2.1Station precinct development

Rail stations play a definingrole in the form and function of urban land use and transport systems. Given the accessibility gains generated by new and existing rail stations, planners have increasingly sought to intensify density within station precincts in order to capture greater public transport mode share through increased walk-on ridership. Transit oriented developments (TODs) are “development near or oriented to mass transit facilities, areas of compact, mixed-use developments and a high quality walkable public realm, located within proximity to well-connected public transport stops” (Cerveroet al. 2002).As with other models of urban development such as Smart Growth, (Outwateret al. 2014), Urban Villages (Li et al. 2014), and compact cities (Jenks et al. 1996), TODs are now widely part of urban planning policy, as public agencies are driven by concerns for the sustainability of urban regions, particularly in securing a good quality urban life within an energy and resource limited future.

The Node Place model, developed by Bertolini (1999),draws on earlier theories of the land-use and transport feedback cycle to provide a means of analysing station precincts.

Figure 1: Node/Place model (Chorus and Bertolini 2011)

According to Bertolini, stations are both “node of networks” and “places in the city” (Bertolini 1996, p. 332). The model outlines five types of relationships between Node and Place: Stress, Dependence, Balance, Unbalanced place and Unbalanced node. The Node/Pace model has been adapted and used to analyse stations in several international regions(see Peek et al.(2006) for a review of several applications in the Netherlands; Chorus and Bertolini (2011) in Japan; Kamruzzamanet al. (2014) in Brisbane). The wide applicability of the model and the development of a number of other typology approaches to station precinct development support the view that TODs take a number of forms depending on local and urban regional contexts (CTOD 2013; Falconer 2014). One application of the model highlights the importance of distinguishing between potential and performance (Brand-van Tujinet al. 2001, cited in Gert-Joost Peek et al. 2006). The distinction between current performance as TODs and potential to become TOD is important, as TODs may establish over time and require ongoing strategic planning and management. For this reason,Dittmar and Ohland (2004) cautioned against defining or evaluating TODs based purely on physical factors and identified other factors that are important including location efficiency, value capture, place making and regional accessibility.These are important considerations for cities such as Perth with historic patterns of sprawl and emerging compact growth agendas.

2.2Station in freeway medians

Despite the interest in developing typologies of TODs, there has been little recognition of opportunities and constraints associated with TODs located at stations in freeway medians. In San Francisco, several lines of the Bart System are partly co-located with major interstate highways. Built at the height of auto-dominance in city planning and in a region containing one of the highest rates of car ownership in the world at the time (Webber 1976), the BART line stations were originally designed for park-and-ride (PnR), to capture ridership within the low-density urban catchment. Current policy direction is in line with transitioning many PnRfacilities at BART stations to TODs (Willson and Menotii 2007). These aspirations tend to require long-term commitment from government because land proximate to major transport infrastructure is not always valued highly by the market and at-grade PnR is often considered highest and best use. The densities required at BART stations to generate ridership levels equivalent to existing park and ride are significant and may not be deliverable by the market. This creates disincentive for BART, who have prerogatives to maintain (or grow) transit mode share and not disadvantage current patrons (Duncan 2012). Some TODs at stations located near freeways are achieving modest success such as Mockingbird Station in Dallas Texas (Dittmar and Ohland 2004) and Pleasant Hill, San Francisco (King 2012). Other stations located within major road reserves have developed in very different regional and cultural contextsthat limit the transferability of policy lesson for Australian cities. Stations at Zuid, Amsterdam (Bertolini and Spit 1998) and Orestad, Denmark (Knowles 2012) have developed adjacent to motorways but have high levels of regional accessibility. New stations in China (Cervero and Day 2008) and Hong Kong (Xueet al. 2010) have very different institutional factors and very high levels of urban density.

In Perth, Western Australia (WA), rail infrastructure was built in the late 1800s linking the port city of Fremantle to central Perth, Guildford and Armadale (PTA n.d.). The station precinctsalong these heritage lines developed largely independent of major road infrastructure, although for some of its length the Armadale line runs parallel to a highway. Since the early 1990s two additional major rail lines have been built linking Perth to Joondalup (1991) and beyond, and Mandurah (2007). The Joondalup line has been extended since and now extends to Butler. The two lines feature twenty-two stations. Two more stations are proposed on the Mandurah line (Karnup and Aubin Grove) while the Joondalup line is anticipated to extend as far north as Yanchep by 2031. The Mandurah line is situated within the median of Kwinana Freeway as far south as Anketell Road and the Joondalup line in the Mitchell Freeway median as far north as Burns Beach Road (excepting a deviation to the Joondalup City Centre).

Since the early 2000s, strategic metropolitan planning in WA including the Network City (2004), Directions 2031 (2009) and million (2015) growth paradigms have emphasised a degree of urban polycentrism. They have acknowledged the need for the city to make better use of metropolitan rail assets including accessibility to stations. In 2009, State government planning policy 2.4 (SPP2.4) was released specifying design criteria for activity centres and corridors. Activity Centres are Western Australian vernacular for TOD and their hinterland and are intended to be:

“community focal points …includ[ing] activities such as commercial, retail, higher density housing, entertainment, tourism, civic/community, higher education, and medical services. Activity centres vary in size and diversity and are designed to be well-serviced by public transport” (State Planning Policy 4.2 Activity Centres for Perth and Peel,Government Gazette 2010 p. 4139).

State Government planning policy has defined many existing stations within the freeway medianas Activity Centres and therefore contexts appropriate for higher density residential development and greater land-use intensity.A planning challenge for development in these precincts is the resolution of current and future conflict between development intensity and local access needs, interchange functions (car/ bus-to-transit) and background traffic (district traffic movements). The latter variable is particularly important in the context of freeway median stations but has been subject to little research. Many of the precincts feature legacies of earlier auto-centric policy such as remnant low-density development and fragmented land tenure. Station precincts also function in different ways contingent on their role within the greater urban system with respect for their distance from the Perth CBD and local land use. On these bases, uniform growth policy is inappropriate: stations should be evaluated for their current performance and potential, especially as constituents of a much greater city system.

2.3 Station functions – Place, Node and Background Traffic

The selection of relevant criteria is critical to establish the function of stations as Nodes and Places, and to assess the impact of Background Traffic within the station precinct. Station precincts need to be compact, support a range of activities and have a high quality pedestrian realm to function as successful Places (Cervero 2005). There needs to be adequate employment opportunities to support some self-containment and attract trips from other stations on the public transport network.

Quality of place is also important.Places should be comfortable and easy to walk around, with limited impact from vehicle noise or emissions. The impact of road infrastructure and traffic on the quality of everyday urban life has been well documented (Appleyard 1972). There needs to a good supply of developable land to ensure future development opportunities. Without these features, stations are a risk of becoming Transit Adjacent Developments (TADs) rather than TODs, where development is present yet has a poor relationship with transport nodes (Renne2008).

Interchange functions are important for stations to perform as successful Nodes. These functions can be both road (e.g. kiss-and-ride and park-and-ride) and feeder transit-based. Stations in low-density cities such as Perth can serve large residential catchments and Node functionality is particularly important. Access for bicycle trips also contributes to the Node function of stations.

Background traffic can confound both Node and Place functions, and this is relationship is of primary interest to the current research. In TODs, residential car ownership is lower generally than in non-TODs while actual vehicle trip rates are significantly lower (Arrington and Cervero, 2008). Nevertheless, high densities of land use can still generate relatively high intensities of vehicle trips. The orientation of the street network in TODs is therefore towards local traffic access at managed speeds. Furthermore, agglomerated economic activity can yield relatively high freight traffic flows where again, local access is of principal importance.

Access to the station by feeder modes is critical at Nodes. Node and Place functions often conflict because the former relies on transport interchange and the latter on walkability and co-location of land use activity with the station. Arguably, there are means to reconcile both objectives for station precincts through definition of sub-precincts, traffic calming and rationalisation of park-and-ride within spatially efficient decked structures.

In contrast, high levels of background traffic would seem to denude both Place and Node functionality. Co-location of train stations with major road interchanges and within freeway medians leads to mixing of through-traffic and traffic trying to access the station. It also compromises both opportunities to co-locate land use with the station and quality-of-place. Costly grade-separation may be able to reconcile background traffic and Node functions (at least partly), but is unlikely to benefit Place functionality

The research reported on in this paper involved the development of a Place, Node and Background Traffic model to address the question: how do stations located in freeway median compare to other stations with regard to their current performance and potential of transport and land-use function? The research incorporated a sample of 13 stations on Perth’s metropolitan rail network.

3. Methodology

3.1Station sample

The 13 stations in our sample were selected through application of a typological framework. The variables in the framework were:

  • Rail line (heritage or recent construction)
  • Co-location of stations with or separation from major roads or freeways
  • Co-location of stations with or separation from major road interchanges.

Figure 2illustrates the four examples of station types included in the study.

Figure 2: Example stations (Source: AUDRC)

Heritage line stations / Freeway Interchange / Freeway midblock / Divergent stations

Although the research question is concerned with stations located within freeway medians or adjacent to freeways, we also included for comparison stations along the heritage lines. Stations included in the study were Subiaco, Cannington, Maddington and Midland (Heritage line stations); Murdoch, Cockburn Central and Stirling (Freeway Interchange stations); Warwick, Glendalough and Leederville (Freeway Midblock stations); Joondalup and Wellard (Divergent stations); and Greenwood (a control site; freeway median station with no activity centre). Each station precinct, excepting Wellard and Greenwood, has been identified as an Activity Centre in Western Australian State Planning 2.4. There are expectations that the station precinct at Wellard will become more transit-oriented in the future (Curtis et al. 2009). The station locations within the Perth metropolitan region are illustrated in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Station locations

3.2Analysis

Multi-criteria analysis (43 measures) was used to assess the performance of the selected stations. Secondary data obtained from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the WA Public Transport Authority and Department of Planning, and modelling outputs from the Strategic Transport Model developed by the WA Department of Planning was applied. The Node/Place framework was used to guide the selection of data.To allow disaggregated analysis, Node and Place indicators were further categorised as domains. These domains reflected either current performance or potential Node and Place functionality.To better reflect the interaction (and potential conflict) between car mobility and public transport traffic, an additional indicator, Background Traffic, was included. Data was processed using ArcGIS and Microsoft Excel. A summary table of raw individual indicators was created and then the 43 criteria were transformed/standardised to a value between 0 and 1 (see the Appendix for the criteria). For criteria hypothesised to represent a positive relationship with either the Node, Place, or Background Traffic functions, 0 was attributed to the station with the lowest raw data value and 1 attributed to the station with the highest value. Conversely, for criteria hypothesised to have negative association with the Place, Node, or Background Traffic function (e.g., longer travel time to a station means lower access; higher values for hardscape/shade balance and noisescape indicate poorer amenity and comfort; higher Volume/Capacity ratio means higher congestion conditions) the opposite was applied; a value of 0 was attributed to the station with the highest value. A linear interpolation method was applied to determine the values for the remaining stations/activity centres within the range 0-1. The benefit of the method is in providing a measure to easily compare the stations relative to each other. The disadvantage is that the magnitude of the metrics is ignored.

The Background Traffic indicator consists of two domains representing the degree of constraint in the station precinct, encompassing total vehicle movement including station access in the morning and afternoon peak period times.The first domain captures the Traffic Function in vehicle capacity and level of service measures. The second domain measures the Capacity of the road network including vehicle lanes and regional road network features. The aggregation of scores provides a rudimentary indication of Background Traffic and it is important to consider each of the two domains separately when evaluating the station precincts for Node/Place performance and potential. For example, there may be more potential for TOD in Heritage line station precinctswith busy local roads than for TOD at stations located near busy major arterial roads.