System Test, Evaluation and Validation

Discuss about the Critical Analysis on the Sydney Light Rail Project.

The chosen project has been the Sydney Light Rail Project and previously, the system design details and other similar factors were discussed. In this part, a critical analysis of the system design has been conducted.

The successful running of operations, the company needs to fix a specific system design test as well as evaluation. As per the project plan developed and followed for the Sydney Light Rail Project, some critical analysis can be made on the design optimization technique followed by the company (Birdsall 2015). Again, the company requires several operations in order to maintain the services as well as to provide extremely reliable services to the passengers that are studied closely. In this chosen case study of light rail development project, generation of revenue is the most important target since the services cannot be continued daily without sufficient generation of revenues (Olesen and Lassen 2016). This revenue comes from the daily commuters (passengers) who have to buy tickets of certain prices to avail the services of the light rail. However, by far the most important human factor that affects the design concept is the availability of an effective management system (Chandler 2015). In all parts of the project – from the planning and design phase to fully operational phase, an effective management system ensures proper running of every activities of the project.

In this report, all these aspects and factors have been critically analyzed and discussed.

System tests should be done by the following procedures.

1. The company should conduct a survey on the created route and try to find possible faults in the tracks or in the design.
2. After this, test runs are to be made with the light rail trains in order to analyze the available system to the passengers.

• A quality check procedure is to be done to check quality of services as well as the interior designs of the train cars.

1. The electronic ticketing system should also be checked properly in order to avoid any mid-route mishap.
2. Another system test is required for final evaluation of the route and checking of the overhead wires.

The evaluation of the complete design should be made based on different factors. This evaluation includes the management procedures, customer satisfaction, generated revenue and financial feasibility. This is mainly because the project is based on public transport service and hence, the economic feasibility of the project depends on the number of general passengers in the system (Martin 2014). This number directly depends upon the number of popular and busy areas the route touches. The company is also poised to provide extremely reliable services to the passengers in order to gain more and more customer base. As per the plan of the company, the route is set to pass through several busy commercial sectors of the city as well as transit outlets like airport, ferry ghat, etc. Implementation of the light rail network will require digging and blocking of the chosen route. This phase will cause extreme traffic havoc and congestion as well as sheer inconvenience of the daily commuters (Peter, Jeffrey and Garry 2013). The evaluation process can  provide a precise method to calculate several constraints that might be faced in the later parts of the projects.

Optimization in Design

Validation of the project will be done when the testing and evaluation phases are complete and the authorities show green light for further proceeding with the project. This will result in further execution of the project with exclusion of some common problems and issues.

As per the project plan developed and followed for the Sydney Light Rail Project, some critical analysis can be made on the design optimization technique followed by the company. As per the project plan, the company emphasized on the busiest areas of the city that are used by the people during the rush office hours (Ney and Gray 2014). Hence, the design of the light rail had to be such that it passes through the busy commercial sectors as well as through the road junctions where there is too much traffic congestion. However, the flaw in this plan is that the company will face massive problem during the project execution phase. Implementation of the light rail network will require digging and blocking of the chosen route. This phase will cause extreme traffic havoc and congestion as well as sheer inconvenience of the daily commuters. Hence, without suitable planning or providing alternative temporary routes to the daily traffic, the project will have serious obstacle for execution.

Again, the design of the light rail project should be such that the company is able to provide proper services during rush hours in order to gain more passengers every day. The main problem is that the company should design the route in such a way that two-car light trains are run at a frequency of at least one in every five minutes during rush hours. The route has to be such that the trains can be easily reversed at the end of the light rail route.

Another aspect for the optimization of design is maintenance of the economic feasibility of the project. Before executing the project, the potential business and economy of the company should be analyzed. For this, the total number of daily passengers has to be estimated and a suitable ticket price has to be set. If the estimated values are economically feasible for the company, the project should be executed.

Finally, one main factor to be considered for the optimization of project design has to be passenger comfort and a user friendly environment within the rail cars. For this purpose, air conditioning systems can be installed within the rail cars along with a digital display system that will show the current stop of the train (Olesen and Lassen 2016). All these factors will sum up to a great optimization in the project design and will ultimately help the company in gaining a huge passenger base.

Operations for Reliability and Maintainability

The company requires several operations in order to maintain the services as well as to provide extremely reliable services to the passengers. These are discussed as follows.

Reliability – The company is poised to provide extremely reliable services to the passengers in order to gain more and more customer base. As per the plan of the company, the route is set to pass through several busy commercial sectors of the city as well as transit outlets like airport, ferry ghat, etc. During rush hours, there should be increased light rail service frequency in order to accommodate more passengers and help them reach their destinations in time (Hensher 2016). Moreover, the services should include a very comfortable experience for the daily commuters. Every day, the number of light users will increase if the provided services are reliable and always help passengers reach destination on time.

Maintainability – In addition to reliable services, the company should also maintain every aspects of the light rail system in order to provide sustainability to the whole light rail project. In addition to keeping services intact, the maintenance of the management team and the whole system management i.e. maintenance of the trains, financial records, electronic ticketing system, cash transactions are necessary. If any of these factors are not maintained properly, it will lead to complete disaster and failure of the project (Miller 2014). For the maintenance purpose, the company should employ more professionals as well as maintenance workers for maintaining the total light rail system of the city. Maintainability also implies complying with traffic and road rules as well as other rules and gudinelines.

In any system design concept, human factor is one of the primary factors that are to be considered for designing the proposed system. In this particular case study, the following human factors were considered during the design phase.

Revenue Generation – The main target of any system design is to generate highest amount of revenues that will help in running the business efficiently as well as further upgrading services in the future. In this chosen case study of light rail development project, generation of revenue is the most important target since the services cannot be continued daily without sufficient generation of revenues (Ho et al. 2015). This revenue comes from the daily commuters (passengers) who have to buy tickets of certain prices to avail the services of the light rail. Again, this revenue should be spent on upgrading the light rail services for increasing passenger comfort and user experience.

Human Factors in Designing Concepts

Customer Generation (Popularity) ­– Another important human factor for this light rail project is the popularity of the services. Any business or commercial service is called as successful if its popularity increases gradually. One primary objective of this light rail project is to attract more and more passengers and to provide comfortable experience to the customers so that the popularity of the services gradually increases. This is also related to the business of the company i.e. with increasing popularity, the number of daily passengers increases and hence, the revenue also increases by a significant amount (Down et al. 2014). Again, increasing in the popularity within the national scale will attract tourists from other countries who will then avail the light rail services when they visit the country. This not only benefits the light rail company but also the government of the country as it gains more international exposure and revenues.

Economic Feasibility ­– Economic feasibility is another human factor that is related to this system design. This is mainly because the project is based on public transport service and hence, the economic feasibility of the project depends on the number of general passengers in the system. This number directly depends upon the number of popular and busy areas the route touches. Again, the prices of tickets will directly affect the daily passengers that will prefer the light rail service.

Efficient Management ­– By far the most important human factor that affects the design concept is the availability of an effective management system. In all parts of the project – from the planning and design phase to fully operational phase, an effective management system ensures proper running of every activities of the project. For instant, during planning phase, a management system is needed to conduct a survey and analyze project feasibility. Again, after completion of the project, a suitable management team is needed to control the operations efficiently. This includes management of the company operations, providing services at peak hours as well as maintaining passenger comfort and ticket prices.

Conclusion

From the report, a general idea has been received in form of the critical analysis of some basic points required for the system design a model public service. As per the discussion in the report, the construction of the light rail project is underway by following a specific system design. This design has its own advantages and flaws. Hence, a critical analysis has been conducted in order to analyze all their points and the results have been published already.

The recommendations for the company are as follows.

1. A quality check procedure is to be done by the company to check quality of services as well as the interior designs of the train cars.
2. The design of the light rail project should be such that the company is able to provide proper services during rush hours in order to gain more passengers every day.

• The services of the company should include a very comfortable experience for the daily commuters.

1. It is suggested that after completion of the project, a suitable management team is needed to control the operations efficiently. This includes management of the company operations, providing services at peak hours as well as maintaining passenger comfort and ticket prices.

References

Birdsall, M., 2015. From Metro and Light Rail to Trains and Trams: Exploring Sydney, Australia’s Expansive Public Transit Initiatives. Institute of Transportation Engineers. ITE Journal, 85(11), p.31.

Birdsall, M., 2015. From Rapid Transit and Light Rail to Trains and Trams: Exploring Sydney, Australia’s Expansive Public Transit Initiatives: Part Two: Sydney’s Light Rail Expansion. Institute of Transportation Engineers. ITE Journal, 85(12), p.28.

Burke, M., Currie, G. and Delbosc, A., 2014. Performance of Australian Light Rail and Comparison with US Trends. Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, (2419), pp.11-22.

Chandler, B., 2015. Australia award for urban design presentations in Melbourne. Planning News, 41(9), p.6.

Currie, G. and Burke, M., 2013, October. Light rail in Australia–performance and prospects. In Australasian Transport Research Forum, Brisbane, Australia.

Downs, C., Cassels, B. and Ericksen, J., 2014. Case study of rail design on Gold Coast Light Rail. CORE 2014: Rail Transport For A Vital Economy, p.76.

Hensher, D., Mulley, C. and Rose, J., 2016. Preferences for BRT and light rail. Restructuring Public Transport Through Bus Rapid Transit: An International and Interdisciplinary Perspective, p.209.

Hensher, D.A., 2016. Why is Light Rail Starting to Dominate Bus Rapid Transit Yet Again?. Transport Reviews, 36(3), pp.289-292.

Ho, C., Hensher, D.A. and Mulley, C., 2015. Identifying resident preferences for bus-based and rail-based investments as a complementary buy in perspective to inform project planning prioritisation. Journal of Transport Geography, 46, pp.1-9.

Martin, S., 2014. Moving beyond cost: Evaluating LRT and BRT options for Australian and New Zealand cities. CORE 2014: Rail Transport For A Vital Economy, p.178.

Miller, N., 2014. The impact of a new light rail network upon walkability in a central business district.

Mulley, C., Tsai, C.H.P. and Ma, L., 2015, September. Does residential property price benefit from light rail in Sydney?. In Australasian Transport Research Forum (ATRF), 37th, 2015, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Mysydney.nsw.gov.au. (2012). Sydney’s Light Rail Future: Expanding public transport, revitalising our city. [online] Available at: https://mysydney.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/user-files/uploads/light-rail-future-web.pdf [Accessed 20 Aug. 2016].

Ney, S.M. and Gray, D., 2014. Western Sydney Light Rail-connecting the people of Western Sydney to the future. CORE 2014: Rail Transport For A Vital Economy, p.111.

Olesen, M. and Lassen, C., 2016. Rationalities and materialities of light rail scapes. Journal of Transport Geography.

Peter, N., Jeffrey, K. and Garry, G., 2013. Peak car use and the rise of global rail: why this is happening and what it means for large and small cities. Journal of Transportation Technologies, 2013.