A Small City with a Big Rail Network! | Railways of Perth Explained 

Check out our latest video on Brisbane's amazing transit right here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-iOemjHJxwRE.html

as someone who lives in perth and has never really put too much thought into the public transport, this was very entertaining and educational to watch. Thank you.

Hi Reece. I'm not familiar with your channel, but this video was posted on the Perth subreddit. We all enjoyed your attempt to pronounce Joondalup. We say 'Joon-duh-lup', with all syllables around the same length. Thanks for covering our city, and we'd love to have you if you do plan to visit or stay! There were originally plans to sink the main rail line, but that hasn't come to full fruition yet. They are removing several level crossings through the city though. Bayswater Station is currently under renovations. There's a bridge by the station that is infamous for having trucks disregard the low headroom sign and run into it, but it's being removed and replaced with a better bridge. The bridge is a local meme with a running count online of 'days since incident', which sadly will disappear after the renovations are completed.

So a fun fact is when Perth electrified their rail network, Auckland bought their old rolling stock and that was what we used until a majority of our network was electrified 10 or so years ago. We still use a few of the diesel rolling stock for a section of the network that is still yet to be electrified. I think the two cities also use the same rail gauge, thus the use of their old trains.

He's doing my hometown! Woo! I think a lot of Aussies probably don't realise that Perth has really good public transport. Perth did things very differently to the rest of the country as there was no appetite to privatise anything here, so that allows Transperth to coordinate everything and develop long plan goals. The system is also cheap to use. I believe the new airport line will travel through Perth Station and terminate in Claremont - new facilities have just been built there. I live in Subiaco so now two lines will use my station and I shouldn't have to wait for longer than 5 minutes for a train.

I'm from Perth and grew up using (and hating) Perth's public transport. But I now truly appreciate it and think it's pretty good for a city given its circumstances. Perth is a notoriously low density and sprawling city, where car ownership reigns supreme - quite the opposite of New York or London or any other city lauded for its public transport. Yes driving to most places isn't for everyone...but using it for your regular commute (most people's most commune route) is just fine once you've worked it out. Trains on the Joondalup and Mandurah line feel luxurious - so spacious, clean and frequent. Probably the best I've travelled out (outside the mega-dense cities in Asia like Tokyo and Singapore). I look forward to the future growth and improvements to the rail network!

Holy Crap so much has happened since this video was uploaded. since then the the following has happened. - The Airport Line opened - Bayswater Station was demolished (Along with the bayswater bridge) and the new station is under construction. - The new C-Series cars have been under going testing on the Mandurah and Joondalup lines. - The Armadale line is closed from Victoria Park station to Armadale to make way for the removal of level crossings and the new Byford station. - the Yanchep rail extension is under going testing and will be open this year. - Lakelands station opened on the Mandurah line - The Morley-Ellenbrook line will be opened later this year.

Sydneysider here, just coming into say that having spent some time in Perth, they hands down have the best transit in Australia. Absolutely fantastic train service, and the bus-rail integration is spot on. In Sydney I always drive unless I'm going right into the CBD or the airport (not because the airport is well connected from the western suburbs, but because the parking is even more painful than changing at Central). In Perth, even if where you want to go isn't on the rail system, no problem - the buses are logical, easy to figure out, clean, reliable and well planned. Oh... and in the CBD.... completely free. Frikkin awesome.

The Perth suburban rail system is world class now, a long ways from what I remember in 1969 with the old diesel railcars. The 1979-1983 Fremantle line closure was a low point. I revisited Perth in 2009 and was really impressed with the expanded and modernized suburban rail system.

I really enjoyed seeing this video about the quality rail network of my home city. I'm a transport consultant myself and often feel people in Perth don't recognise how high quality our public transport network is. For a city that was literally planned around the car in the 1950s and has massive sprawl issues, the way they've retrofitted such a high quality rail network into a car-oriented city is quite impressive and should be a model for other car based cities. Something else you might find interesting is that every railway line also has a cycle path going alongside it, with major stations having large secure bike cages that require an ID'd Smartrider to access. Combined with a very high quality cycle path network (Perth is a very bike friendly city), this offers a lot of excellent last mile solutions. It is literally faster for me to cycle to my nearest station on the Mandurah line than to drive or catch a bus.

Some additional points regarding the Perth rail system: 1. the Armadale line will be extended further south to Byford to access that growing area, adding 8 kilometres of track and one station (at Byford) 2. the Midland line may be extended further east to Bellevue which would add about 2 kilometres of track and one station (at Bellevue) whilst Midland Station is being relocated about 500 metres east of its existing location 3. there has been no desire to add additional tracks to the Midland line as it is believed the new signalling system will cope with the anticipated traffic on the Perth to Bayswater section of 24 trains per hour, as well as a couple of pinch points where four tracking in any case would not be possible (so say the planners anyway) 4. one of the primary reasons for the Thornlie-Cockburn line right now is in fact to run through trains from Mandurah to Perth Stadium Station to encourage people to take the train to events at Perth Stadium rather than cars (a new platform is being built at Perth Stadium Station to accommodate these trains) 5. there is a potential to extend the electrified system from Thornlie Station to High Wycombe Station (terminus of the Airport Line) along the existing freight corridor to make direct trains from Mandurah and Armadale/Byford to Perth Airport as High Wycombe Station has been built to make such an extension feasible with minimal work. There is a short chord at Kenwick Station already extant that connects the Armadale Line to the existing freight line 6. Should it become necessary in the future, the Thornlie-Cockburn link could be easily extended along existing freight corridors to Fremantle Station. Part of that line south of Fremantle Station previously saw passenger trains during the America's Cup in 1987 7. whilst no active provision has been made for it (rather short sightedly) there is a future possibility of a direct connection between the Ellenbrook Line and the Airport Line to enable direct trains from Ellenbrook to the Airport and southwards towards Cockburn Central and Mandurah, but that would be many years in the future. 8. operationally trains from the Airport Line will generally run through to Claremont on the Fremantle line to minimise terminating trains at Perth Station. Presumably a similar situation will operate when the Ellenbrook Line opens 9. the Armadale/Thornlie line will close for 18 months from early 2023 to enable the section between Carlisle Station and Beckenham Station to be elevated (a la Skyrail in Melbourne) to enable elimination of 6 level crossings. Welshpool Station will permanently close as a result of this due to low patronage

Thanks for your excellent video. As a Melbournian, I find it ironic that Perth's rail coverage hasn't got more coverage in Australian media. And it took a Canadian to do it!

I'm from Sydney but spent about 3 months living in Perth for work in the early 2000s. I used the free Cats (metro busses) when traveling around the CBD and trains when traveling to and from the suburbs. I get this was some time ago and only for a relatively short time. But I do remember thinking the public transport felt more reliable than Sydney's. Of course it was servicing a much smaller population in a much smaller geographical area. But I got by without a car living in West Perth (inner city) and Cannington (the burbs). For what it's worth, I'm not downplaying Sydney's public transport. Our rail network is incredibly complex which is the result of it being much older and servicing a huge population. Sometimes I'm amazed at how well it does given the circumstances. But if you're in the suburbs of Sydney, your millage will vary. If your suburb has a train station and you're mainly traveling to the CBD or other large population area then you'll love our public transport. Otherwise, you'll probably need a car.

I like how 60% Of comments are Perth residents, and I’m one of them.

Perth resident here. Interesting to see your take on our rail system however it still has a lot of issues. Our trains are fast but our stations are sparse and last mile public transit is an absolute nightmare in many parts of the city. Our city has a particularly low population density because most people live in large houses on large blocks of land and our urban planning has historically been centred around owning a car - very similar to American cities. The result is that unless you live close to a train station (most people don't), you will have to take a bus to your final destination and these buses are low in frequency (compared to many European cities), often out-of-sync with the train timetable and take a long time to reach their destination because of the distances they need to travel and the high frequency of stops needed to serve all of the areas on their routes. The urban sprawl also means that you may end up walking almost half a kilometre to get to the bus stop from your house. The result is that most people just chose to drive unless they are commuting to the central business district in peak hour, when there is nowhere to park. In peak hour, some people are able to make use of park 'n ride facilities but these aren't available at all stations (underground carparks might help solve this but they would cost the government a lot of money I don't think they are willing to spend). There are also many suburbs where a rail line or a station with park 'n ride facilities is not within a reasonable distance which means a slow, frequently-stopping peak hour direct bus into the CBD is the fastest means of public transport. If I could drive to work, it would take me 12 minutes however on public transport, it takes 45 minutes! Cycling is an option but the distance is such that I would have to shower and change clothes at work due to the sweat which ultimately adds another 15 minutes to the effective time before I'm at my desk. E-scooters are a way forward that not enough people are talking about. They have the potential to massively increase the accessibility radius of train stations, especially if appropriate infrastructure is built. Our trains are also wide enough to take plenty of folded e-scooters.

Blown away ! Learned more about my local rail transit network from a Canadian than from having lived here for 60 years ! Great channel, great video. The rail upgrades for the new Perth stadium now allow up to 22 trains to be stacked to enable movement of about 28,500 per hour to or from the venue. A magnificent visual site when it is operating at full capacity during stadium events.

For a rather small and somewhat sprawling city I've always felt that Perth is a city that does transit right. The rail network is impressively modern and is definitely among the best in the entire country. The service is fast and frequent with trains on all lines running at least every 15 minutes during the day and with speeds up to 130kph on the Joondalup and Manurah lines; journey times are relatively small. The trains themselves are clean and well maintained with rubbish and graffiti being a rare sight (although I wish the trains had more comfortable seats). The larger stations too are very well designed with plenty of amenities; shelter and very easy interchange with bus services. It's the little things too that make Perth's rail system great, for instance at many stations the platform sits level with the trains meaning passengers with wheelchairs can simply board the train unassisted with minimal gap between the train and the platform. Perhaps what makes the public transport network a success is that it feels like a truly integrated and connected transport network; with train and bus services working together to maximize public transport coverage. Building a rail line on a freeway reserve isn't good for walkability with trains stations having small walk-up catchment, but despite this the Joonadlup and Manurah lines attract good patronage partly by having effective feeder buses that transfer passengers on and off the rail network. Even in the outer suburbs it's not uncommon to have buses running every 20 minutes, 15 minutes, or in some cases; every 10 minutes during peak times. This is perhaps in contrast to some North American cities that build new rail lines and simply rely on park & ride to get passengers onto trains. It's amazing to think that despite Perth having a smaller population than Brisbane and it's rail network being around half the size; Perth's rail network consistently gets more patronage than Brisbane's rail network, which shows you what a rail network with good frequencies and good integration with other modes can achieve.

I’m so glad you covered this system of Perth, Western Australia, Australia! I often used studied the system over the last two years, the first time I ever started studying passenger train systems in Australia! I was quite impressed with the system in Perth, and given the size of the city and how the regional rail system operates, I think it’s quite an amazing system!

Wow, didn't expect Perth to be covered tonight, a welcome surprise. I don't catch the train much, but they're alright when I di

Great video on my home city , there is so much happening on our PT network it is hard to keep up with the projects. Some of the projects include rebuilding old sections as elevated rail. Perth is the poster child of how you can take a car dependent sprawling city and turn it into a pro train city. Perth came very close to losing its train network in the 1970’s to one that Perth people are now proud of.

Seeing a structural analysis of Perth's public transport system from an international perspective definitely helps me appreciate what I have more! Perth people always complain about the public transport, possibly because lots of people here are from/have holidayed in Asia or England, and have Singapore and London to compare to. There's definitely unreliability as to bus punctuality and many suburbs aren't connected super well, but I suppose bus routes are all decided based on demand and patronage. But as for the suburban train system, it definitely helps to see from a third party view about how well designed it is! Also -it throws me a bit when you say regional rail to refer to transit within a city, because here regional rail is out to the regions/regional towns, as opposed to between suburbs within a big city. What do you call train systems servicing regional/rural towns? Also: Joondalup is pronounced JOON-duh-LUP, same intonation as kangaroo

Couple of things you might be interested to know: The Mandurah line replaced a pseudo-BRT system between Canning Bridge and the Elizabeth Quay Busport (previously known as Esplanade) there's still some evidence of it in the form of dedicated bus entry/exits to the Kwinana freeway near both ends. Both Warwick and Whitfords (on the Joondalup line) have the bus concourse directly above the platforms while Kelmscott (on Armadale line) actually has them at grade in the middle of the two platforms. Prior to the Perth City Link project (sinking the Freo line west of Perth station) being completed the through running was actually Fremantle - Armadale with Midland terminating. The freight corridor for the Thornlie - Cockburn link was deliberately kept wider to accommodate the passenger rail expansion. You mentioned capacity issues on the Midland line, hopefully the signal upgrade assists with this because at the moment there won't be capacity between Bayswater and Perth (mostly on the Claisebrook - Perth segment) resulting in some services having to terminate at Bayswater (Ellenbrook line when it gets built) even currently when there's an event on at Optus stadium they have to close Claisebrook and McIver stations to be able to run the extra services. Unfortunately quad tracking this corridor wasn't thought of and so it's going to be difficult to do. Apparently the ultimate plan with the Forrestfield-Airport link is to run it further south and then loop it back into the Armadale line so that'll be interesting to see!

The Perth network has become a classic S-Bahn, with suburban above-ground lines connecting through the city centre by tunnel. This is the ideal way to expand rail coverage of a large urban area which has generally suburban density, rather than building a metro. The S-Bahn concept that started in Germany has spread across the world. The video also shows that the 'Cape gauge' of 3 ft 6 in (1.067M) is able to deliver most of what a standard gauge railway offers - and has a long-term future, with WA (Perth Region) and Queensland taking up with Japan has done successfully for decades. The extra 3 inches over the metre-gauge (3ft 3 in, 1.0M) seems to make a real difference, enabling trains to be as heavy and wide as on standard gauge lines, though with lower maximum speed. ''Cape gauge' is one of the British Empire's legacies to the world.

Excellent video. Just one thing: Joondalup is pronounced with the stress on the first syllable ie. "JOON - da- lup." However, you did pronounce Cockburn correctly. Many place names in Western Australia end with "up", which comes from an Aboriginal word meaning 'place of," eg. Boyanup, meaning "place of rock." And yes, Perth does actually look as good as it appears in the video.

I particularly think it’s quite amazing how the regional passenger train system of Perth, a very isolated city of Australia, has a great system but not Adelaide, which is closer to several other major cities of Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane. That said, Adelaide is the only remaining major city to not have a fully electric regional rail system, but Perth, given how isolated it is, has a fully electric regional rail system!

It's hard to emphasise enough how much the Perth system relies on high speed. In a low density city like Perth, the primary competition is the private car. So designing a system that forces riders to transfer from bus to train doesn't seem like the obvious solution (forced transfers in isolation are usually supposed to be an anti-ridership thing). But two things about the Perth approach stand out. Firstly, the trains are fast. And secondly the transfers happen (generally) a good long distance from the CBD. By spending a large part of the journey on very fast vehicles the disadvantage of a forced transfer is entirely offset, and public transport becomes a compelling option. It's often said that transfers can make your transit better. Perth is how.

Reece - Good video. Some history/background: * Thornlie wasn't part of the original 3 lines. It is a result of the previous plan to route Mandurah trains via there. Fortunately that didn't happen with the more direct freeway alignment chosen instead. But Thornlie got built as a stub. The benefit is wider than that though as it allows the longer distance Armadale trains to run express, improving journey times. * Agree on comments re capacity. A disadvantage of the airport line is that peak trains on related lines will only be every 12 (not every 10 min). This has a major knock on effect to the bus network. Currently peak buses are every 10 min (main routes) with even local routes every 20 min. However 12 min train frequency will cause many bus routes to be only every 24 min in peak - a poorer service that's not clockface or memory. This is documented in the released plans for the airport area bus network. The trade-off is that stations like Bayswater will have amazing service. * Perth has integrated train/bus multimodal fares. Therefore whether CBD transport is free or not doesn't affect train usage or cost for commuters. Perth was one of the first Aust cities to do integrated fares (in the 1970s along with Adelaide). * There have been a few interesting schemes. Eg the promises for MAX Light Rail that came to nothing about 10 years ago by the Barnett government. * Perth doesn't get enough credit for its train frequency. With its 15 min off-peak 7 day service it is more consistently better than any Australian city apart from Sydney. Very roughly Perth has double Brisbane's train frequency on half the number of lines and half the stations. Yet its rail patronage exceeds Brisbane's. Perth has done a lot with a little due to working its trains hard 7 days and better integrating with buses. Neither are done by lazy and disjointed Brisbane. It's slow but Perth has gradually extended its 15 min service over more of the day including Sunday morning and early evenings (at times where a 30 min frequency is common in all other Australian cities outside Sydney). * Perth also needs credit for its bus network reform. There's still some complex routes and 120 min weekend headways but it's vastly better than in the '90s. There is a frequent orbital route. 900-series routes have tram-like operating hours and frequencies including 15 min maximum waits on Sundays. Government hasn't put a lot of money into increased bus services in recent years but the bus planners there know what they are doing and have been able to increase the number of all day frequent routes. The network is far less radial than the less versatile networks of Adelaide and Brisbane. Rail and bus are planned very closely there, unlike other cities (notably Brisbane) where there isn't much coordination. This has enabled buses to feed rather than duplicate trains with higher frequencies possible in the suburbs. * Passenger information is also quite good. Perth often has multimode network maps at stations. Something that cities like Melbourne could learn from. * There is a feeling there that there's a competent transit authority when travelling the network. You don't get that feeling in some other cities. To summarise Perth has better transit than you might expect from its urban form. Whereas there some other cities (especially with older urban patterns) that are better than their transit.

So fun to see my city featured on this channel! I catch Transperth trains and buses frequently, they're honestly the easiest and cheapest way to get to the city CBD. I'm hoping the Metronet promise for light-rail eventuates, as there are plenty of local councils with long-term plans for tram routes. Bit worried about the possibility of being stuck with trackless trams though, as a very influential transport planning figure over here (Peter Newman) has been pushing for them.

Hey Reece, I think it'd be cool to do a video ranking the rapid transit systems of Australia similalr to the videos you've done with America and Canada since their are actually a similar amount of sytems to Canada, it'd be interesting to hear your rankings and the pros of cons of each system (In your eyes).

Nice one! I love how Perth has taken a long term approach to transport planning. Things as simple as building the underpass off the Mandurah line north of Cockburn Central to enable the future Thornlie-Cockburn link - 15 years ago. Not to mention the beautiful integration of the Optus stadium with the rail system and active modes. Perth is a shining example of why "$city is too small for transit" or "$city is too sprawly for rail" arguments are nonsense. So many cities can learn from Perth.

My Dad drives trains for Transperth! It's a good system, at one point I was catching the train and bus to high school. Though when I lived in Ellenbrook the rail line was an election promise many times and never happen. It became a bit of a joke. But the developer does deserve some credit as they designed the suburb with a rail corridor. Which is pretty rare forethought haha Perth definitely needs a ring line, ideally from the Joondalup line through Ellenbrook, to Midland and then as you suggested southward. (Also I'm sorry but that's not how you pronounce Joondalup. But that's ok 😅) It may have been mentioned before but in the last decade or so they've also developed an extensive bike network that also integrates with the train stations. Though I haven't visited in a few years so I haven't had a chance to try any of these things.

Great overview! The Airport line is scheduled to go into operation by the 30th of June, and will run on B series trains from Claremont on the Fremantle Line through to the new High Wycombe station on the Airport Line. We are truly blessed to have such a nice transport system here in Perth and to have a government which supports funding for it!

While stations in the middle of freeways look cool, I was surprised to find it a less than pleasant environment because of the noise of traffic, and fumes. The stations off the freeway are a much better waiting environment. What is cool is travelling on the train at 130 km/hr past cars limited to 110 km/hr, or less because of congestion.

RM Transit-“Melbourne and Jakarta are the closest major cities to Perth” Adelaide- “Am I a joke to you”

I'm not sure if plans have changed since the initial pitch a few years ago but my understanding is that they are planning to make one giant ring around the city, or several smaller loops. I know one part will be to connect the Ellenbrook line to the Joondalup line probably through Reid highway and connecting through to either Stirling or Warwick station.

This is such a good video Reece. Really touches on the many features that makes the Transperth network so good. It was also great that you touched on some impending issues Perth's rail network is about to face, with over-crowding on the Joondalup Line, and track congestion on the Bayswater group. To relieve some of the pressure on the Joondalup Line, the State Government is investigating a 'second northern railway' to serve the future area of East Wanneroo. Branching from the Ellenbrook Line near Malaga. Some ideas for connecting this East Wanneroo Line to Perth, is to quad-track between Perth and Bayswater station (like you said), or dig a parallel tunnel about 2km to the north, that goes to Morley and Edith Cowan University. But both of these result in the East Wanneroo Line bypassing all of the existing suburbs such as Mirrabooka and Alexander Heights. We have been advocating for the East Wanneroo Line to instead use a combination of tunnel and elevated rail (which we know you love), that runs through the middle of Perth's northern suburbs and then 'through-runs' to the Armadale Line. This proposal reduces the over-crowding on the Joondalup Line, reduces the track congestion on the Bayswater group, and increasing the frequency on the Armadale/Thornlie Lines as trains no longer terminate at Perth.

I had no idea perth had such a good system, I'm thinking of moving there in 2024 for study and so far I've been very impressed

Thanks for an informative and accurate explanation of the Perth Metronet system which is my home city. If I remember correctly many years ago when planing concepts were being considered there was a workimg party that specifically went to Canada to examine the majour city transport systems there to see if they could adapt some of their features here. Vancouver and Montriol were mentioned. The original designer of the Perth modern tail system was later employed to run the Sydney design and I believe now works in Canada.

Thanks for covering Perth. For someone who lives so far away you really covered it well, and I enjoy your videos. There is a additional extension underway that was missed, Armadale to Byford, and also as part of Metronet a portion of the Armadale Line will be elevated to eliminate road crossings. As the C-Series come online, the A-Series trains will slowly be retired and replaced by B-Series on those services. The projects you mentioned are all currently under construction, and will still take a few years to complete. But for what's next, there is talk of a Trackless tram (Gadget Bahn) running to Scarborough Beach, and an LRT running from the East, through the City to the University of Western Australia. Quad tracking of a portion of the Midland line as suggested is not likely. Services on the Airport and Ellenbrook lines will continue on to the Fremantle line turning at Daglish and Claremont to give capacity on the inner section of both the Fremantle and Midland lines. Quad tracking would bypass stations so this capacity increase would be lost. CBTC will help with throughput on these section, and as more capacity is needed the older platforms will all be increased to 6 car lengths.

This was a very helpful and informative video for someone like myself who is considering studying in Perth and wouldn't like to commit to buying and maintaining a car.

Relative to population size, Perth's heavy rail network is clearly ahead of Melbourne's, despite it lacking a city loop. Quite embarrassing that there's now going to be 2 smaller cities than Melbourne that are going to have an Airport link earlier.

Never felt so appreciative of the train line. I didn’t realise how good we have it!

Im a councillor from the city of cockburn. Metronet has a lot of potential growth, and you hit the nail on the head with the loop. Also you have to factor in the presence of optus stadium, having game day services capable of running from the south, up the thornlie line, and dropping attendees off without having to go through perth or transfer will be huge. Im just super stoked for being able to catch a train to the airport. Without it costing some ridiculous price for a private service. Trains to the airport on a regular service im counting as a benchmark of a fully fledged city.

Looking at urban rail across various Australian cities, it’s interesting that dedicated underground/metro lines only appeared recently and that regional trains (thinking Sydney) operate underground and almost metro like, reducing the need for transfers to other transport modes into the downtown core. To the Australians watching this video, would the cities of Perth and Sydney benefit from more underground rail transport or is surface regional rail sufficient enough?

As someone that rides these trains I love the fact you used the actual line colours on the map like we see on the maps irl >.

Mate, thanks for sharing our awesome train network with the world! I live along the armadale line, what's also really brilliant is that that line is undergoing grade separation works in 2023. Essentially the boom gates at each level crossing close for a total of about 4 hours a day, so it's absolutely a nessecary upgrade over the existing non-seperated level crossings. See the Denny Avenue grade separation in Kelmscott as a prime example of that in action. Another note about the airport line, I am hoping that it opens in October, because at that point i'll be able to finally do what I did in Singapore and Sydney, and take the train to the airport for the first time ever. For reference, the 935 and 40 Bus routes are some of the busiest in perth! Another crucial part of keeping car traffic off the roads is the CAT bus system, where it's a hop-on, hop-off bus system designed to loop the cities of Joondalup, (Pronounced JOON-d'-lup, not joon-DA-llup, btw.) Fremantle (their CATs are Orange!) and of course, Perth. I'd love to see the crucial blue, Red and Yellow CATs of the CBD turned into light rail, or trolleybuses at least, especially considering how often these buses get used. it'd also make them way easier for wheelchair users to access as you could just use a low-floor tram or a raised platform. I absolutely like the idea of your ring railroad connection though, it's probably doable seeing as there's freight lines that go through the kewdale-forrestfield-maida vale area that connect to the midland railway workshops and could provide some coverage to the industrial areas to the north of the city. Tonkin Highway also extends out to as far as Bullsbrook, where a lot of development will more than likely occur past 2050. Also, our cycling network is also REALLY interesting, as a budding cyclist. The Principal Shared Path or PSP scheme essentially creates a cycling superhighway all across the city, with major links running through similar corridors that highly trafficked roads and rail lines use, on specially designed surfaces so that cyclists can use for maximum speed. the material uses way, way finer bitumen compounds and thus results in lower friction for cycle tires. Where there are breaks in the PSP there's also signage to direct riders to where other PSPs are, or where the recommended route is. It's definitely nowhere near as good as Denmark, but getting around on a bike, despite the size of the city is absolutely doable. Our roads are also only as wide as they need to be. In suburbs the roads are quite narrow, and in more dense areas they are deliberately small to help calm traffic. The other aspect of Metronet too is the development of areas _surrounding_ the train stations, i.e, what kind of property and businesses are going to be able to be built there. Essentially with Metronet, the idea is that each station's going to get turned into like, a metropolitan hub where there's medium density housing and businesses placed close to the train station. Anyways, cheers for a great vid! If you ever do come live in sunny old Perth, we'll be happy to welcome you here :)

Excellent video Reece! Well researched and well detailed, and this is why your channel has become successful! If you ever do a video on Adelaide, please get in touch! Cheers (The guy who sent you the heap of Adelaide Timetables and Metrocard last year)

Its so weird listening to you explain the public transport in my city over clips of places i visit daily i love it

As someone who has lived in Perth his whole life, and has used Transperth daily for like 5 years now, this video is a fat W and if you don’t subscribe, then you are not normal

Awesome video! So cool to see Perth recognised for something they do really well. I don't know if it has been mentioned in the comments already and I didn't hear it in the video so I though I would share. The Mandurah line has a new station called Aubin Grove only a couple of years old between the Cockburn Central and Kwinana to reduce that 10 minute train ride gap between the two stations. Extra fun fact is that after 12am the train is free to ride which on Friday and Saturday night when the last trains out of town leave at 2.15am has been a lifesaver to get home from clubbing when I live nearly at the end of the mandurah line! :)

This was great! So good to see Perth! Coming up is soon is the elevation of most of the Armadale/Thornlie line which shuts next year for 18 months to facilitate construction. Some other missing pieces for Perth are inner city light rail along the historic main streets and an expanded ferry service to bring to life the river network. Joondalup is pronouced Dune-darh-lup btw (say it quickly no spaces :)

Worth noting that while the on-paper facts of the train lines seem very favourable, and it is indeed a pretty impressive amount for the small city, Perth HAS also fallen into the usual car-focused trap of most train stations having remarkably bad land usage. Surrounded by flat car parks, single suburban homes, and empty lots of land or just a giant freeway, they're not very density friendly. If you came here you'd realize that the train is the saving grace for what the busses and other modes of transport lack! After all, people can only take your train if they can get to the stations conveniently!

As someone who had to commute from Joondalup to Fremantle daily for several years, I am thankful for the Transperth system. The parking at the stations is $2/day and for students, the fare is capped at $2. So $6 a day for a 100km stress free commute and parking was a godsend.

Well done and a great comprehensive review. As a resident of Perth it’s very refreshing to have someone recognize the achievements in this small population in the remote city within our massive state. Excellent work.

I'm sure there have been studies on this, but i wonder if having railways right next to a road encourages more use of public transport. Sitting in traffic and seeing a train zoom past, uninterrupted, must be pretty convincing.

As someone who has lived in Perth, Melbourne, New York, Hong Kong and use trains when i travel to Asia Europe and the Americas. I can attest to Perth transport Network being world class and just as reliable as the bigger cities i frequent around the world. I recently visited the city, took trains for the first time in 8 years and was pleasantly impressed at how much the city has improved. Its Such an underated but beautiful city.

Perth's PT is very surprising in a good way. It is really good for such a small city.

Having travelled overseas and been on the Euro, London, Paris and high speed train to Southern France I absolutely love my train trips from Mandurah to Perth and on occasion straight through to Joondalup. Above ground is always preferred, as a chance to view the suburbs and countryside on the way, it was my highlight of travelling down south across France.

Looking at the map from when Metronet was first proposed as a complete long term project it includes an extension to the Armadale line, a branch from the proposed Ellenbrook line to Wanneroo, and the creation of two loops north and south of the river. The southern loop being the under construction Thornlie-Cockburn and airport/Forestfield lines + Forestfield-Thornlie & Cockburn-Fremantle. The northern loop being a line connecting the new Ellen brook line (following the proposed Wanneroo branch for a bit) to Balcatta. Edit: In fact within WA Labor campaign material "commence building the circle line" appears on one of the Metronet posters, an incomplete purple circle drawn along the around the city.

Joooond'llup! Interesting thing about the Joondalup and Mandurah lines was that the Joondalup line was pre-planned for in the newer Mitchell Freeway median, whereas the Mandurah line was retrofitted into the existing Kwinana Freeway median. they had to duplicate two bridges to accomodate everything too - the Narrows bridge and Mount Henry Bridge!

Wow, cool to see they have an airport line now. I was there in 2017 and remember having to take a bus between the airport and the CBD.

The B Series trains also have a very silent sound, and when they leave and enter the station its sounds pretty important and cool. Although, the A series has doors to separate each car and kids trap themselves in there. I am super excited for the C series as the A series is really old and needs to be replaced.

We are very envious of Perth here in Auckland. With Airport rail much more focused development they are certainly worth talking about cheers Reece!

Brilliant video Reece. For someone who lives so far away, your knowledge is awesome. Great that you noticed the rail station/bus station joint facilities. This has really helped the connections from the freeway train stations to the surrounding suburbs. The challenge for Perth is that we LOVE our cars and we are reluctant to use PT. The City of Joondalup was built 42kms from the city in the hope that it would lead people to live and work in the area. But, of course for Perth, many people took advantage of the cheaper land out there and built their houses. They then decided to drive into the city for work rather than take the train. Very impressive that I learnt a lot of things that I didn't know from your video. Thanks for taking the huge amount of time to put it together.

Ive been working on the Metronet design over the last few years. It really is a massive project and it kept a lot of us in work over the c19 lockdowns. I was working on the project from home in Sydney; literally on the opposite side of the country.

On the note of the railway guage, that's just one of the many weird intricracies of Australian federation As you said the 3 older lines were made prior to federation in the 1800s, and in that time, all of the Australian colonies (now the states) used different guages One of the major reasons for federation in the first place was the unification of railroad guages, which happened for interstate lines but within the states, never actually caught on, so Perth has been sticking with the older narrow guage because they never changed it back in 1901

It’s interesting that our rail network could be seen as impressive. The major issue with transit in Perth is that all roads, and rail, lead to the cbd and nowhere else. And our urban sprawl is reflective of this trend

I have been waiting for somebody to cover Perth’s train network for so long and you’ve done really well, thank you!!

Thanks man, I know you have so many cities in so many countries which you have to cover, but it's always great when you see your country getting covered

G'Day from Perth, mate. Interesting overview of the rail network around the city and suburbs. Joondalup is pronounced "june -da-lup" - run them together and say it fast. Not "june-dal-up". Fun fact - any place name in 'Straya ending in 'up comes from the Aboriginal word meaning "near water". Oh, and you're more than welcome down here, you'll find the weather way better than what you get in Canada! 😁 Cheers cobber!

Been waiting for this video for a while so very nice to see! Takes on our system by locals and transit minded people tend to be very pessimistic so it's refreshing to hear this these takes. But there are some huge drawbacks which are a huge killer but if someone in government were to spend time on it at any point in the future it would be easy to fix. And it's that the stations on the newer lines are so far spaced they basically serve slivers of dormitory suburbs on either side of the freeways, and the freeways themselves are dead zones. That makes it not usable for the overwhelming majority of people along the lines, even paired with bus use. The new extensions to Ellenbrook and Cockburn are even worse. The other problem is ballooning costs. In the 2000s that Mandurah line, tunnels, bridges, bus transfer station-bridges, modifications to the freeway and all cost less than a billion dollars. The Thornlie Cockburn link costs just as much for two stations along an existing, already graded rail corridor with existing tunnels. Infrastructure needed for the link was built as part of the Mandurah project with foresight and it was still cheaper. New stations on the new lines are transit fortresses that don't age nicely and don't really provide much more shelter. They feel unsafer too with less natural surveillance and need more active security. The old lines are better to use with stations that are just a bit of paving with a tin roof. All that extra money could build denser stops, and even multiplatform stations to allow express services since adding more stations on such long lines would impact existing commuters.

Another nice thing, on-top of transit and Metronet, Perth/WA in general are also investing heavily in bicycle infrastructure. the overall plan is the WA bicycle network, there's an extensive long term cycle network plan with transit and commuting as major targets. So yeah, the city is making a fair effort to reduce car dependency.

I've been waiting for this video to come out for a year and im so proud to see a video about the city I live in

I was hoping for a clip of Warwick Station on the Joondalup line when talking about bus routes feeding stations in highway medians, because it has the bus station on the roof of the train station.

Hey, I like your video. FYI, the Fremantle line used to travel a bit further south. The line is still there, but only used for freight now. As others have mentioned, Joondalup does not have the 'a' stressed when spoken. If anything, it's more JOON-d'-lup.

Perth features in the top 5% of more than 450 cities worldwide ranked by the Mercer Quality of Living Survey (March 2019), and consistently ranks in the top 10 of the Economist Intelligence Unit’s World’s Most Liveable Cities survey (out of 173 cities), reaching equal best rating of 6th in 2021.

Love your work as always RMTransit and thanks for covering my hometown! Perth has an excellent public transport system for a city of its size and density. It used to be quite poor, I think the catalyst to improving it started in the 1980's when the Fremantle line was closed but public pressure forced its reopening and then with the early 90's electrification and then gained further momentum with the opening of the Joondalup line and later the Mandurah line. The quality and frequency of bus services has improved massively as well , for example I grew up in an inner Perth suburb in the 1990's where on a Sunday the bus frequency was every 2 hours, and the last bus out of the city was at 730pm! Now it runs every 15mins during the day on a Sunday and every half hour in the evenings until 11pm.

Great to see more videos discussing Australia’s rail network👍

I think it'd be rather interesting to see a video or two about the various regional rail services in each Australian state. Victoria's V/line or Queensland's long distance trains certainly have some interesting details about them

One of the best parts about the renaissance of Perth's rail network is that it indirectly led to a similar revival in Auckland See, those diesel trains shown briefly at 6:14 were only 5-20 years old when made redundant by the electrification of Perths rail network, and thus were made available on the second hand market. At the same time in the early 90s Auckland's rail network was going through a lot of the same problems that Perth's had been before its turnaround: underinvesment, aeging equipment (the coaches were from the 1930's) falling ridership, and talks of complete closure. Foruntately, the relevant government's instead scooped up the secondhand trains at basement prices from Perth in 1992 and 1993. Ridership finally started to increase after decades of decline. This began a gradual revival of Auckland's rail network: In 1995, the old post office in downtown Auckland was purchased by the government for reopening as a transit hub: this eventually came to pass in 2003 as Britomart (now Waitemata), allowing trains to actually run into Auckland CBD, and coincided with a general increase in service. At the same time, secondhand British Mk2s converted to narrow gauge used as push pull sets were used to increase capacity. In the early 2010s, service was expanded with the new service Helensville in 2008 (ultiamtely axed), Onehunga Branch reponening in 2010 and the Manukau staiton opening 2012. This all coincided with a government intiative to *FINALLY* electrify the Auckland Rail system (which almost happened- twice in the 1950s and 1970s, only for the National Party to say no), completed in 2015. The wires are now also set to expand down the rest of the Southern Line next year, thus making the system 100% electric. Then in 2021, the Te Huia train began, finally giving Auckland a regional train connection to Hamilton in the same way Wellington has the Capital Connection and the Wairarpara Connection. The service has expanded to have 2-3 trips everyday (except sundays), so starting to feel more a regional train than commuter train. Hopefully, the new government doesn't can the service this June. (Kinda wish they would run the service with a diesel and and an electric locomotive to allow the service to run into Britomart; would probably attract more people than running it to Strand) And of course we have CityRail Link, (which also almost happened in the 1970s), which will really turn Auckland's Rail into an S-Bahn. Now if only we could connect Auckland Rail to the airport. I love being an American who did all this research on NZ transport history, lol. Anyway, great video.

It's probably been posted already, since this video, we've opened a 6th line out to the airport and a few suburbs past it. As someone who doesn't drive, I'm very happy with our transit system, as long as you plan your trips and live close to some form of public transport, you can get around easy enough

By spending money on an efficient rail system they're saving money on constructing/expanding highways.

Perth local here. There are long term plans for another link through the northern suburbs halfway between the Ellenbrook & Joondalup (June-Dal-up) lines to East Wanneroo. Once done, an east - west connecting track from Warwick to Morley is being planned to link the three north of the river railways.

YESSS Finally a Perth Video! I've been waiting so long for this.

I live in Perth but haven’t used the trains more than 5 times. The network may look extensive but the suburbs are really spread out, and unless you work in the CBD or in a walking distance from a train station, it is not convenient.

One thing that was done fairly well (with one glaring mistake) was the introduction of Smartrider, our electronic ticketing system. Having a consistent payment structure over all public transport and reconciling payments etc instead of realtime account debit makes the process very quick compared to most others I've used (looking at you Melbourne).

Ok, glad you could pronounce Cockburn correctly but Joondalup needs work :D Great video none the less!

The public transport in Perth really is amazing. Every time I'm there its easier to get around using public transport most of the time than it is driving, especially around the busier areas

it’s so weird that i’ve been violently drunk at most of these locations

Due to the dense, hilly and often historic areas between cockburn central (which i live near) and Fremantle, and the sheer density of the port area, i have my doubts that they'll be able to extend a train line between the two, as much as i wish for it, without demolishing homes alongside the freight corridor the thornlie link is being run alongside. (it goes literally right by my home, you might fit one track more in but any more and you'd start running into problems... Some of the grade separated overpasses involve deep cuttings, and even then you face the problem of crossing over the freight corridor to reach Fremantle Station which is gonna be a pain in the arse given we try not to mix freight rail with passenger rail here.) There's some pristine, significant and protected bushland in the way as well if a new route were to be laid. The grade fluctuations alone would require extensive and expensive work to prepare for a line. But i still would love to have a circle or at least semicircle line in the future.

Now looking back on it I sometimes take perth public transport for granted, it's a great and easy way to get around! Loved the video

Yesss move to Perth! While it's not perfect, our public transport is sooo good. I can't drive yet but I've never encountered any problems with travelling all over Perth (including all the way into Gnangara and Halls Head) for shopping and whatnot. And I'm so hyped for the Thornlie-Cockburn link because it means two new stations right near my house. Thank you for the video! It's so great to see our little city's public transport get some international attention. :)

Completely didn't expect to see a video about Perth! I actually think the system could have way more stations along the Joondalup and Mandurah lines considering the density of houses along the highways.

I love how you somehow managed to pronounce cockburn central “correctly” yet butchered Joon-dal-up 😭😭😭 Hahaha. I grew up with this network and also think it’s awesome!

So cool to see my city and its rail network on this channel! Thank you!

Wow, I loved this video. As someone from perth I just take it for granted but have never really thought how extensive our metro trains are when compared to other metro setups.

Do Oslo please! I beg you, they have many new lines and stations planned. 😊

Very good, except for your pronunciation of Joondalup lol ;) Next you've got to do Brisbane/Gold Coast, since you've done the other Australian big cities

Now that you mention it, I really should appreciate the rail network of my city.. I happen to live in an area without great rail access, but along with Transperth buses I can get anywhere. It's good to see that more is planned for the future too. Really well made video, and cool to see my city in the spotlight :)

It's always good to find videos of my hometown in my feed.