1. Metrolink interview
Oliver Rogers T218732 1
What precautions do you take to ensure the safety of pedestrians?
Is this er in in relation to the Oldham Rochdale Metrolink extension. No problem at all. Well
the safety of pedestrians and our passengers is paramount importance to us, now
throughout the design stage and the construction of Metrolink we involve experienced
traffic and highway engineers to ensure that the actually design is. Can be implemented
safely and the final solution will be safe for pedestrians. Traffic for greater Manchester also
involves a group called the disability design reference group who are made up of
volunteers from partly within our organisation and within disability reference groups
outside of our organisation who help us inform the designs and make sure that they’re safe
and accessible for people with any mobility issues and that sort of thing so those various
assets help us to ensure that they the Oldham metro link line and the rest of the network is
safe for pedestrians.
Have there been any major accidents involving pedestrians.
again is this is if I’m assuming this involves the Oldham Rochdale line that has been recently
opened in areas where there is intended interaction between Metrolink and pedestrians
and vehicles we’ve not had major issues again similar to the points I raised before, we want
metro link to interact safely with pedestrians and vehicles or intended junctions and so
that’s not been an issue
Is safety the most significant priority?
Well it’s it is the most significant priority, we have a number of priorities and the safety of
the public and our passengers is the top priority. We also need to be aware that we have
priorities to deliver you know a safe reliable comfortable public transport option. Now the
measures mentioned before during the design and the construction of the metro link
extension we believe enables us to be confident that we can do that with the Oldham
Rochdale line and on the rest of the network, is got an excellent track record over the last
20 years of being open the Metrolink has interacted very well in public spaces and so on.
Are tram tracks appropriate for the safety of pedestrians as they cross through roads and
pavements?
Well , it’s it’s a new addition and a new change to areas when we first put tram tracks in
into an area and there’s a couple of locations where we’ve done this on the Oldham
Rochdale line specifically in areas which will interact with the public so the Oldham
Rochdaleextension that’s critically near the Oldham mumps junction and at the a laid there
are now tram tracks in areas where the public may not have been used to them before and
would naturally come into interaction with them. Now tram tracks themselves and the
vehicle and the movement of Metrolink vehicles is controlled in mostly the same way as
cars at junctions so the tram is driven on the line of sight system by a driver and you can

2. Metrolink interview
Oliver Rogers T218732 2
almost imagine as like I say like a car so the driver has the ability to stop the vehicle and will
actually go through very slowly and junctions where we interact with pedestrians and so we
believe that all measures undertaken throughout design and the measures that we have in
place with with operation with the drivers are in place and then the train and they’re safe
make it so that the interaction with Metrolink with pedestrians and pavements and that sort
of thing are very safe it just takes people to get used to it a little bit but the drivers are being
very cautious while people are getting used to Metrolink being a new feature to their
environment.
Do you think that trams being made in Shaw, Derker, Rochdale and Oldham are an
advantage or a disadvantage for the public?
It’s categorically an advantage. It’s essentially, the Oldham Rochdale line was occupies the
space that was formally a heavy rail line the Oldham link heavy rail line which that provides
a service to local communities and public transport to local communities but there were
some shortfalls In that service hence why we actually came around to converting the old
heavy rail line to a metro link line. Now what the advantages are what we believe ,
Metrolink brings to the communities there are well in terms of travel to local urban centres
to Oldham centre and to Rochdale it gives them another public transport option which
wasn’t there before. It also increases the possibilities in the area for employers because
we’ve increased the public transport routes so the staff could use it to get to an area and on
top of this it’s also made the area more viable as a commutable areafor Manchester city
centre and Oldham and Rochdale town centres if you’ve got that reliable public transport
link then any of the areas around the stops can be seen more of a benefit it would be as a
reliable community to local centres so we defiantly believe it is an advantage for Oldham
and Rochdale has it has been for the centres on the extension as well from bury and
Altrincham and so on so erm yeah we believe it is a huge advantage for the area.