I’ve just got back and the squeal is much better today – interesting…what has changed??  I’ve been told that Yarra Trams seemed to do a lot of cleaning last night and again this morning (running their cleaning machine over the tracks).

Does cleaning really make that much difference?  If it does, why did they wait until it was soooo bad???  How often will they do it?

Sounds much more like an alignment issue but I am no tram expert

At least I may be able to sleep here tonight

We were told that the squeal would diminish over 2-3 days.  That did happen but this evening it has returned, and it is bad.  This video shows consecutive trams coming out of the city in the evening peak.  City bound trams are almost all squeal free….could it be load related??

If you are not happy then call 1800 105 105 and politely explain your concern

Hopefully this guy also is ‘hearing’ the problem

The tram works are done for now, the tunnel digging hasn’t started and the noise from the trams has subsided a lot…so I thought I’d turn the time lapse camera to the city last night.

Wow

You should received this document in your letterbox today.  This will be the set up until at least June

I have just come back from the Community Reference Group and have some news.

1. The road part of the works being done out the front are a bit behind schedule.  To finish that work, they will be working at night for the next 3 nights.  Some more details are here
2. Bowen Lane was to be closed in the next week.  It will now be kept open until at least June, perhaps longer.  This will make is easier to exit our lower car park.

..and yes I have raised the issue of the trams being very noisy on the new tracks.  There is some hope that it will improve as the tracks ‘bed in’ and the drivers take a little more care.  It is only some trams – not all.

If it is causing you grief – feel free to ring 1800 105 105 and lodge a complaint.

The schedule says that we will have full operations tomorrow – great to see a ‘test run‘ just now.

Not sure it will be very efficient if it needs six people in fluoro vests to walk in front of each one 😉

Well done all round

Several people have asked me about the ‘noise rules’.  How noisy can it be?  What about at night?

There is no easy answer but the best news is that MOST of the work will be done during weekdays and Saturdays.  Night works will be fairly uncommon

I waded through the many pages and distilled it down to Understanding Metro Tunnel noise limits – apologies that it is quite detailed.

MMRA have their own fact sheet that is also quite good, a little more polished 🙂

MM-FACT-SHEET-Noise-Vibration-MAY-2017

If you’re wondering what it will look like from Wednesday, this is it

There’s a few things to note

• There will be one car lane in to the city and one lane out of the city.
• Trams will run normally.  The stops will be at Toorak Rd (existing stop) and a new stop on the city side of Park St.  The “old” Domain super stop has gone.
• We will not have any car parking out the front.
• St Kilda Rd towards the city will deviate to the far side from in front of the old Police Building.
• You will still be able to get to Bowen Cres (and our top car park)
• You will still have driveway access to the St Kilda Rd carpark.  But you will need the stop/go person to assist you.  It is also worth noting that to exit that car park you will turn right from the car park and join the traffic heading to the city – effectively a U turn.
• Albert Rd is already in its ‘final’ configuration – traffic in both directions is on the city side of the park.
• Pedestrians will be able cross the works area at Park St.
• Walking to the city on the opposite side of St Kilda Rd, looks a bit tricky.  Seems you will need to loop up near the fountain, around Cobbers Statue.

All of this was in the info sent out some time back but thought a quick refresher may be handy.  This is not an official position but my reading of the info provided.

You should also be aware that my best guess is that our trees will be removed next week.

The next stage is a big hole on the city of the station box, starting in May.  Our ‘big hole’ will occur in the Sept – Dec time frame (I think)

No night time action recorded last night, but here is the view from yesterday (including a mystery arm)

Was it just me, or was it nosier last night??  They had the road profiler out there around 230am!