City Circle

The City Circle is a system of largely underground passenger railway lines located in the central business district of Sydney, Australia, that make up the heart of the Sydney passenger railway network. The lines are owned by RailCorp, a government agency of the state of New South Wales, and operated under Transport for NSW's Sydney Trains brand. Despite its name, the City Circle is of a horseshoe shape, with trains operating in a U-shaped pattern. The constituent stations of the Circle are (clockwise): Central, Town Hall, Wynyard, Circular Quay, St James, Museum and back to Central.

History and description

The original concept for the City Railway was part of a report dated 1915 submitted to the government by John Bradfield upon his return from overseas study, with work commencing the following year.

The City Circle was built in stages. The first stations to open were Museum and St. James, which opened in 1926 as part of the initial electrification of Sydney railways. Next was the "western limb" through Town Hall and Wynyard, which opened in 1932 in conjunction with the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. This section contains four tunnels. Two connected to the Harbour Bridge, while the two City Circle tunnels terminated at Wynyard. In 1956 the dead ends at St. James and Wynyard were joined and the "missing link", Circular Quay – was opened. Central and Circular Quay are above-ground stations (Circular Quay is elevated, directly underneath the Cahill Expressway), while the remainder are below ground. Several unused railway tunnels also exist. The former tram tunnels at Wynyard, and other stub tunnels at St James are well known.

Conservative Party (UK)

The Conservative Party, officially the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-rightpolitical party in the United Kingdom. It is the majority party in the House of Commons, having won 330 of the 650 seats at the 2015 general election. Between 2010-15, it was the largest single party with 303 Members of Parliament and governed in coalition with the Liberal Democrats. It is the largest party in local government with 8,296 councillors.

The Conservative Party was founded in 1834 from the Tory Party—giving rise to the Conservatives' colloquial name of Tories—and was one of two dominant parties in the 19th century, along with the Liberal Party. In the 1920s, the Liberal vote greatly diminished and the Labour Party became the Conservatives' main rivals. Conservative Prime Ministers led governments for 57 years of the 20th century, including Winston Churchill (1940–45, 1951–55) and Margaret Thatcher (1979–90). Thatcher's tenure led to wide-ranging economic liberalisation and saw the Conservatives become the most eurosceptic of the three major parties.

City Circle Tram

The City Circle is a zero-fare tram running around the central business district of Melbourne, Australia. Aimed mainly at tourists, the route passes many Melbourne attractions while running along the CBD's outermost thoroughfares, as well as the developing Docklands waterfront precinct.

History

The tram route was introduced on 29 April 1994, requiring a small track extension along Spring Street, between Collins Street and Flinders Street, to enable a complete CBD loop to be formed. The Commonwealth Government's Building Better Cities program funded the $6.4 million capital cost of the track expansion, while the State Government funded the running costs.

Until January 2003 the western leg of the original route of the tram was down Spencer Street, but the route was then extended west to run through Docklands. The travel time around the circle before this change was 40 minutes.

During early 2006, new Passenger Information Displays (PIDs) were installed with Digital Voice Announcements (DVA) from the series 1 announcements. The information display upgrades were due to the unreliability and the storage capacity problems since the route extension into Docklands.